


A Study in Red

by alicat54c



Series: Spider Boxes [2]
Category: Daredevil (TV), Deadpool - All Media Types, Jessica Jones (TV), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: Angst and Humor, Avocados at Law, Civil War (Marvel), Clone Saga, Deadpool Thought Boxes, Human Experimentation, Kid Fic, Kidnapped Peter, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Minor Character Death, Science Experiments, Slice of Life, Trish doesn't know how she became Wade's sidekick either, but like a crazy slice of life, nothing too graphic though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-02
Updated: 2016-09-27
Packaged: 2018-07-11 20:49:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 17
Words: 29,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7069456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alicat54c/pseuds/alicat54c
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It started, as all worthwhile things do, with the glorious gluteus of our favorite neighborhood wall crawler.</p><p>{Danger Will Robinson Danger!}<br/>...</p><p>Because even when two masked individuals put in their maximum effort, something is bound to scrape wrong when they try to realign their lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Breakfast Avocados

…

Peter had nightmares, about Uncle Ben, Gwen, strange fever dreams conglomerating his villains of the week into terrifying masked terrors, the classic forgetting your clothes at school… pretty standard waking up in the middle of the night sweating terrors.

Wade had nightmares too; he was a soldier who’s records were still mostly thick black sharpie lines over text. But after the whole thing with Weapon-X, when Wade’s near two year long adrenaline high finally began to fade out, some of the things he had been pushing to the back burner began to catch on fire.

His partner noticed, of course, but they weren’t the type to mention early morning hours where they held each other, just to ensure that the body beside them was real. Nor did he query the screams, other than to mix them in with soothing nonsense words as he rubbed the other’s back.

Peter was used to nightmares.

But he wasn’t used to this.

“Hey boo, why is the bathroom mirror smashed?” The spidery hero poked his head out of the bathroom door, toothbrush handing from his mouth as he rubbed his eye.

Wade leaned around the kitchen stove, grinning through the red fabric of his mask. “What was that Petey-pie?”

“Mirror. Broken?”

“Oh that.” He turned back to the pancakes sizzling in the griddle. “Reflex punch. The guy on the other side of the glass gave me a weird look.”

Peter blinked forcefully, brush drooping between his lips as he tried to string those words into a comprehendible order. “…Do we need to get a new one? Or is this a ‘let’s call the landlord’ thing?”

The merc shrugged, prodding the pan with a spatula. “Naw. What do we need reflections for anyway?”

“Never struck me as the vain type Wade.”

“Well, it’s easy to not be self conscious about looks when your actor won this year’s sexiest dad award!” His sharp tone startled them both.

A dollop of toothpaste leaked onto the younger man’s shirt. He fumbled. “Ug, nope, you don’t move, I’ll be back!”

The door slammed, followed by several rounds of tap, rinse, and spit. 

Wade turned off the burner, and fiddled with the frills on his ‘Kiss the Cook’ apron, before sitting down at the tiny Ikea table, which looked like the balanced breakfast of a cereal commercial. 

A moment later, Peter emerged from the bathroom, eyes more wide with wakefulness than before. He sat across from his lover, gaze intent.

“Are you ok?”

“Fine! Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Then why did you smash the mirror?”

Wade waved his hand, which still had shards of glass sticking to the leather. “Sorry. Won’t happen again.”

“And what about the photo album?”

“What about it?”

“You ripped up all the pictures inside yesterday.”

“I wanted to practice my new career as a paper shredder.”

“Wade, you only tore yourself out of all the pictures.”

“Well, you can’t ask me to ever mar the perfection that is your face!”

Peter sighed through a laugh, trying to keep his expression light through the worry gnawing at his mind. The hero plucked at his wrist, the motion familiar even though he wasn’t wearing his costume. 

That sleek sleek costume, which hung well in all the best places, accentuating all the right angles and curves. My, what anyone would do to a body in that spider suit, mmm~! Cat suits got nothing on that! Hey, maybe I should write the Black Cat into this fic? I don’t know much about her character, but it could cause some tension in the spideypool, and then there’d be a big makeup scene (oh but wait, I don’t write smut). What do you guys think?

{I’m game!}  
[Count me in too!]

Wade pressed the heel of his palm to his forehead.

“You ok boo?”

Deadpool waved off his concern. “Yeah, just sometimes the narrative gets a bit distracting. It’s nothing.”

[Yeah, it’s nothing.]

{Just us.}

The merc pressed his skull between his palms. “Shut up!”

“Wade?”

“Not you!” Deadpool quickly corrected.

“Wade, I’m the only one here.”

“No, it’s-“ He pressed his skull between his hands. “There’s just this buzz in my head ever since, you know.”

[That’s rude.]

{I am so much more coherent than a buzz! Probably.}

The pressure increased, until his gloves creaked. 

Gently, Peter covered his hands with his own. “Wade? Please stop. I don’t like seeing you hurt yourself.”

“It’s not like I’ll stay hurt,” the other quipped, hands thumping onto the table with such force, the cutlery rattled.

Peter drew back a breath. “That’s not the point.”

“Well, too bad, because I’m in pain all the time. Because, oh yeah, I can’t die! So don’t worry yourself about me, because even if my spleen decides to crawl out of the monstrosity that is my face, I’ll still be fine!”

“Wade, don’t say that. You look-“

“Don’t you dare say you don’t care about how I look, because I’ve seen your eyes linger more than that unwanted friend at the end of a house party.”

Peter snapped. “Ok, fine. You look like a waffle’s funhouse mirror cousin. Is that what you wanted to hear? That I miss running my fingers through your hair and your hauntingly perfect golden tan? Ok, I admit it, I miss those things. And does my eye sometimes trace the cookie cutter visage of the good American Captain with less than pure thoughts? Yes, I’m only human.”

He leaned across the table. “Sure, good looking pancakes will catch my eye at the table, but we both know the carbo load that makes the best breakfast is wrapped up in sweet genuine sugary goodness. Wade, you’re the maple syrup in my life, it doesn’t matter whether you look like a waffle or a pancake. I fell in love with you at first bite, and baby, I can’t go back. No matter how many Aunt Jemima’s throw themselves at me, I’ve been ruined.”

{Da’yam.}

[I knew we loved Spidey for more than dat ass.]

Wade chuckled wetly. “You know I can’t resist a good food metaphor, and you had to pull out the heavy guns and make it breakfast.”

“It’s the only way I knew you would believe me.” Gently, the shorter man stood and crossed to his seated partner. “Now let’s get you outta red cat suit and eat. Then after, if your appetite isn’t satiated, you might have to put it back on and help Spiderman chase some no good criminal across the city.”

The mercenary hummed deeply in his chest, arms twining around his waist. “And what if I’m the no good criminal you have to chase?”

Peter pulled the mask off the other’s head, running his fingers softly over the sensitive skin. “Well then, I guess we’ll have to find out~.”  
…

It wasn’t always unicorns and rainbows, even with the two masked individuals putting in their maximum effort to re-align their lives. 

Peter still worked at Oscorp, because he found that not only was a reasonable salary a nice way to not starve, but being his own inside man to potential nefarious doings was surprisingly useful. Wade still got his ‘tuition’ at St. Margarets, though his gold cards tended to be of a much higher profile than before, what with his new identity as Deadpool.

But sometimes, the couple would call in sick days. Like today.

Wade clutched his skull in the middle of explaining the virtues of Bea Arthur. His words skittered, disjoining and slurring, until the mercenary clenched his jaw shut, teeth creaking as he held back tremors. He rubbed his knuckles across his sternum apologetically and tapped his head. ‘Sorry, having a bad brain day.’

Peter put down his book and walked over. “Need to sit down until the cancer starts to lose again?”

The taller man nodded, and let himself be led back to the bedroom, while his lover shot off a text to his boss telling him he was going to be late.

Peter sprang for silk sheets, after he noticed how the normal cotton brand rubbed raw patches into Wade’s already sore ridden skin. The mercenary didn’t voice any discomfort, and the sores healed into the mosaic of his body after a few minutes. However, Peter knew his powers didn’t include pain relief along with the regeneration, and hurt just looking at him.

Gently, the spidery hero eased his partner onto the sheets, smiling at the near silent sigh as he slid under the comforter.

“Do you want me to stay here?”

Wade shook his head, fingers signing out a reply. Peter smiled, and kissed his forehead. 

“Ok, I’ll be back around lunch time. Just hit the speed dial if you need me, and I’ll be over no matter what.”  
…

“Can’t move,” Wade wheezed. “All my organs hurt too much.”

“Ok.” Peter slipped onto the side of the bed later that evening. “Can I touch, or not today either?”

“Just be gentle with me.”

“Aren’t I always?”

“Unless I ask really nicely.”

Chuckling, the spidery hero ran his fingers over the other’s shoulder. “Hang on, I’ll be right back.” A quick trip to the bathroom, and Peter was squirting lotion onto his palms to rub into the dry cracked skin of his lover’s back.

“So, I’ve been thinking.” He said, gently teasing the taught muscles away from pain. “We should get married.”

Wade made a ‘Go on’ motion with his wrist.

“I mean, we have been technically engaged for over a year, and I’m thinking we can just file the paperwork, and use the cash we save on a ceremony to spend our honeymoon in a jacuzzi full of maple syrup in some five star hotel, or something. What do you think?”

“But I wanted to pick out a dress,” Wade slurred, turning his head slightly from the pillow. “ ’n you deserve a big bash, babe. Last chance for the world to see what it’s losing, before we tie the knot officially.”

The hero’s hands stilled. “You sure?”

“Heck yeah!” The merc heaved himself onto his elbows. “Think we could get the whole city to show up if we do it in costume? I can picture the headlines, ‘Spideypool Finally Cannon’!”

“Jameson would probably have an aneurism.”

“So is that a yes?”

Peter resumed his massage. “Maybe not just yet. I feel like if we plan it to fast, we’ll have a Wreck It Ralph scenario, where a giant bug monster eats you on our wedding day, and I’m thrown into a spiral of cold hearted revenge. Either that, or we’ll get arrested. Possibly both.”

“Aw, but babe, you’d look so hot in a space captain suit.”

“I like the one you got for me better.” He tickled the base of Wade’s spine. “But we should definitely get a license before we start planning all that.”

“Gonna be difficult. I think I’ve been declared dead at least three times that I know of.”

Peter hummed, gently tracing the sores on the other’s back. “Guess we’ll need a good lawyer then.”  
…

Much later, in a tiny office across the city, which could barely manage to keeps its lights on, the power couple waited in the entry way, clad in civilian garb. Peter fought for Wade to leave his costume at home, citing how a lawyer might be hesitant to represent an out vigilante. He still kept the mask though.

A petite blonde woman poked her head around the paint peeled office door. “You two can come in now.”

Peter smiled, and Wade pulled his hood lower over his face to disguise the red and black.

Inside the tiny back room, a blonde and brunette sat behind their desks, smiling politely as the pair sat down.

Peter cleared his throat. “Uh, hi Mr. Murdoc, Mr. Nelson. Thank you for seeing us.”

“Well, the proposed fee you offered was unprecedented, so we felt it best not to conduct this interview over the phone.” The blonde nodded at his glasses wearing companion. “Please, call me Foggy, and that’s Matt.”

Matt’s attention seemed utterly focused on the couple, nearly to the point where he almost forgot to nod when introduced.

Foggy cleared his throat to cover his partner’s lapse. “So, how can Nelson and Murdoc help you?”

“We need to get a marriage license retroactively.” Peter played with Wade’s fingers where they intertwined between the folding chairs. “See, cuz my boo’s an illegal, and the ID he used to sign up for the military was pronounced dead about a year ago.”

The merc leaned in. “We heard from Samantha at the taco shop you guys are ok with keeping green cards on the down low.”

“Uh.” The blonde lawyer tried to share a look with his blind companion, before being reminded of such an act’s futility. “Wouldn’t you rather have him not pronounced dead?”

Peter shook his head. “There’s kinda a government conspiracy involved. I could pull up the HYDRA forms, but I really don’t think you want to see them.”

Deadpool looked up, letting his hood fall back enough for his masked face to become vividly apparent.

“Uh.” Foggy fumbled with his notepad, eyes darting from the vigilante to his partner, who, while unable to see the mask, picked up on his companion’s stress. The blonde cleared his throat, collecting himself. “Ok. Can you tell us anything that might help us push your plea in case it gets contested?”

Peter hummed consideringly, head tilting to the side. “Well, we got engaged just before the diagnosis.”

Mr. Nelson nodded. “Ok, that’s good. Do you have a ring or anything? Proof of purchase?”

Wade scratched the back of his head, and turned apologetically to his lover. “I’m gonna come clean Petey, I got the transformers ring from a vending machine.”

The brunette patted his shoulder consolingly. “It’s ok dear, remember, I was there when you won the skee ball tickets for it.”

This time Matt glanced sideways ineffectually at his partner, who’s footing seemed to have once again been pulled out from under him. “Do you have a history of shared residence perhaps?”

The couple exchanged a thoughtful glance. 

“Hm, nope. We moved into Petey’s apartment, so it’s still in his name.”

Foggy looked just half a sentence away from either hanging his head or cracking up with hysteria. “Is there anything?”

“Oh!” Peter sat up exuberantly. “There were the doctor’s bills! I was listed as your spouse so I could visit!”

The lawyer leapt upon the crumb like a starving mouse. “Great! That’s good! We might be able to use that, especially if he, uh, you died suddenly.”

“Sweet!” Wade crowed, doing a fist pump. “And now that we’ve got that all cleared up, I also wanted to talk about some copyright infringement I’ve been seeing around the city.”

Peter blinked curiously at his partner, while the two lawyers seemed barely able to keep up with the leap in topics.

“Boo, I didn’t know you owned any intellectual property.”

“Of course! I own the rights (under an alias) to Deadpool, the chimichanga-ensalata-miraculuosa,” Wade ticked off on his fingers. “Oh, and Spiderman.”

Matt dropped his cane.

Peter looked at his lover askant. “You own the copyright to Spiderman?”

“Don’t be jealous, you know Spidey and I are bros. He asked me to take it out for him, because he likes the whole secret identity thing, and couldn’t do it himself.”

The soft and squishy expression on Peter’s face made Foggy clear his throat and begin to shuffle through his notes, while Matt’s discomfort at the couple’s mounting… interest in one another grew.

“Right. Uh. Let’s just get the marriage license done first. My partner and I will get back to you on Monday for a followup.”

“Right-o!” Chirped Deadpool, bouncing to his feet.

Peter, who’s eyes hadn’t left his partner’s broad frame, nodded distractedly. “Yeah, thank you very much for you time.”

Linking his arm with the masked merc, the spidery hero dragged him out of the office, gauging whether his fear of Daredevil was enough to squash his desire to find a nice empty rooftop with his hubby. 

“I like those guys,” Wade said as they left the building. “I think we should keep them!”

Peter hummed in agreement, deciding that the devilish vigilante never came around during daylight hours anyway…  
…

“I know that these guys are important, being our only paying people and all,” Foggy said quietly. “But I think they’re the weirdest clients we’ve ever had.”

Matt sighed in agreement, wishing his impeccable hearing could block out the very /very/ distracting sounds coming from the fire escape next door. “You have no idea.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:
> 
> So, I head cannon that Wade still suffers from the effects of cancer periodically, like all over, not just his skin. That can mean having parts of his brain shut down from tumors, thus losing speech and coordination ect., and having horrendous pains as his organs battle it out to stay functioning.
> 
> Oh my god, these two are so fluffy I could die.
> 
> So, masks don’t really work on Daredevil, since he doesn’t rely on sight to ID people. He was all tense during the meeting, because he knew Peter was Spidey.  
> ...
> 
> Timeline:  
> 2006: Peter becomes Spiderman (think Andrew Garfield movies, but kept more under wraps).  
> 2010: Iron Man 1  
> 2012: Avengers, Aunt May dies of cancer  
> 2013: Winter Soldier, THOR 2, Daredevil becomes a vigilante  
> 2014: Wade Meet Peter (flashback scenes from movie) Peter is 24!  
> 2015:  
> Feb: Wade’s diagnosis  
> March: Wade leaves for Weapon X  
> April: Spidey searches, meets the Xmen  
> May: Avengers 2 Age of Ultron  
> Spidey meets Matt in Daredevil S1  
> June:  
> July: Ant Man  
> August:  
> September:  
> October: Warehouse Fire  
> Nov: Jessica Jones S1 starts -ish  
> Dec:  
> 2016:  
> Jan:  
> Feb: Eh, let’s say JJ S1 ends here  
> DP movie  
> Part 1: Love Diff Life ends  
> March: Part 2: Study in Red starts


	2. Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn

…

“Haven’t heard back from the lawyers yet. Foggy sent an email saying their office is currently setting up for a larger case, so our stuff needs to be put on hold.” 

Wade grunted, shutting the apartment door behind him as he pulled off his mask and dragged his feet against the threadbare carpet.

“Long day at the office, dear?”

Deadpool hummed as he flopped onto the couch. “Business at St. Margaret’s has been on the fritz. See, everyone in the Irish mob and their redheaded cousins are trying to get their hands on the biggest and baddest guns in town, but Weasel refuses to take give anyone a gold card from them, on account of the whole massacre thing that keeps happening. Stops people from paying their bills.”

Peter’s head snapped to the side so forcefully his neck cracked. “What?”

The mercenary shrugged, using the motion to throw and arm over his lover’s shoulders. “Everyone think’s its internal territory disputes, but my money’s on it being some anti-hero’s origin story.”

“Why haven’t I heard anything about this?”

“To be fair, the newspaper you worked for was more about celebrity gossip in the form of trashing vigilantism than actual news.” He rolled his biceps again, cuddling the wall crawler close. “The third member of Team Red might know more, as it’s happening in his backyard, but I don’t want you scheduling any playdates without me, capiche? Only my guns are getting anywhere near dat ass.”

Peter sat up straight. “How long has this been going down in Hell’s Kitchen?”

Deadpool’s head fell back, as the heroic tone in his lover’s voice hardened. “Spidey, do we have to?”

“Hey, Daredevil helped me find you, and we shared a special bond over stalking the robot army attacking the Avengers. Bro-code states I must help him in times of need.”

“Fine.” He whined. “We’ll go visit your friend together tomorrow.”

Peter kissed his cheek. “Thanks boo.”  
…

“I’m here to chew bubblegum, and kick ass.” Wade raised the twin hand guns in his fists. “And I’m all out of bubblegum.”

“Put those away,” Peter scolded, scanning the rooftops for any sign of red horns.

Suddenly, his spider sense screamed, and he threw himself sideways, just as a something small, round, and metallic shot past the space where his head once was. 

The bullet ricochet against the stone and his sense screamed again, but before Peter could dodge a second time, Deadpool covered the smaller form with his own. Spiderman felt the merc’s body jerk, but heard no sound of pain except the slight hitch in his breath.

“Deadpool?” He whispered, but Wade was already casting about for the shooter.

“Hey, it’s rude to snipe someone twice without introducing yourself!” He called across the rooftops.

“If I wanted to hit him, I would have.” A voice growled from the shadows, soon followed by a dark haired man with a grim face and tac vest.

“Oh emm gee, Frank? I haven’t seen you since boot camp!” Deadpool mime grabbed at Spiderman’s shoulder with the hand not holding the smaller man behind his back. “Spidey did I ever tell you about my buddy Frank from my law abiding days? Frank, Bob, and I used to have so much FUN together.”

The stranger’s squint betrayed that he knew exactly who was under the mask. “Wilson.” His voice sounded like gravel in a polisher. “Thought you were dead.”

“Only half right. I’m Dead- Pool. You can’t see the hyphen, but it’s trying to convey my witty sarcasm to the readers.”

Frank looked at Spiderman, but the red and blue hero just shrugged in a ‘just go with it’ kind of way.

“So, I see you too have discovered the pleasures of vigilante justice.” Wade continued, ignoring the silent communication. “That’s cool, that’s cool. As you can see, I’ve also squeezed this fine ass into spandex, though standard issue kevlar totally works better for you, I must say. Makes you look all rugged and professional.”

Frank’s finger twitched against the trigger of his handgun, as if he was an inch away from shooting the merc in the face. “What brings you here Wilson? Still working with that Striker team?”

“No, nothing like that anymore, just-“ 

In an instant he leapt forward, ignoring the six bullets an increasingly alarmed Frank pumped into his chest, as he pulled the man taught by his collar. 

“If I ever catch you shooting at Spiderman again, they won’t find enough of you to make a cameo in Season 3. Capiche?”

The corner of Frank’s mouth twitched up mirthlessly. “Oh there you are Wilson. Kid must be a nice squeeze to make you break out your ‘scary voice’.”

“I would offer a play by play, but last time you tried to stab me in the knee, and I just sewed up the last hole in this suit.”

Spiderman inserted himself into the scuffle, cautious of the weapons rattling within easy reach of both men. “Hey guys, can’t we all just get along?”

Deadpool dropped the soldier, hands spread in a wide innocent gesture. “Course we can!” White eyes narrowed at the non masked man, intensity betraying his light playful tone. “Isn’t that right Frank?”

The dark haired man nodded slowly, never taking his eyes from the larger threat.

Spiderman clapped his hands together. “Great! And Frank- Can I call you Frank? I’m calling you Frank. And Frank, we’re just here looking for our friend. Have you seen him? About this tall, red costume, not us?”

“You mean the Devil.”

“Yes, him!”

Deadpool cut in. “Hey, think if we say his name enough, he’ll appear?”

Spiderman hummed thoughtfully. “That’s only worked for me, like, twice. So, maybe?” He brushed off the other to look back at Frank, who’s flat look showed exactly how unimpressed he was with New York’s friendly neighborhood two thirds of Team Red. “So, have you seen him?”

“No.”

“Ah. Ok.” Spiderman rocked on his toes. “I guess we’ll try again later. Uh, nice meeting you?”

The soldier quirked an eyebrow, as if questioning that statement, before turning to leave.

“Hey Frank, where you going? You should totally get tacos with Spidey and me!”

“No.”

“Awe, you got a date? Tell me it’s someplace fun!”

“Hospital,” was all Frank said, before jumping the gap to the other rooftop.

The couple waited a few moments, but when their new friend showed no signs of returning, they relaxed.

Peter rubbed his shoulder, where until recently, Wade’s vice like grip had held him behind the other’s back. “Boo, I think you bruised me.”

“Aw, need me to kiss it better baby boy?”

The hero chuckled. “Maybe later.” He stretched, cracking his back with a wince. “So, he seemed nice. Remind me never to meet your friends from your military days.”

“Remind me never to let you.” The grating growl in Deadpool’s voice startled Peter, but it was soon gone under a valley-girlish lilt. “Ten bucks says we found out who’s going after the mafia~.”

“No bet.”

“You’re no fun.”

Peter stuck out his tongue, only achieving tasting the inside of his mask. “Come on, Daredevil should know about this guy.”  
…

The couple didn’t end up finding the red vigilante of Hell’s Kitchen that night, nor the next.

By the end of the fourth week, Spiderman was beginning to worry that dear old Frank had done something to him, when he saw a flicker of movement.

“Jeez, was that a ninja? Multiple ninjas? Whatever the plural of ninja are?” Deadpool mock whispered at his side.

“I dunno,” he hissed back. “Wanna go check it out?”

“Duh!”

Together the couple jumped closer to the black masked mob, and the red devil attempting to beat them with his fists. In an instant, Spiderman had two tangled in his webbing, and Deadpool narrowly missed slicing the ham strings of another pair.

Despite not expecting company, the ninja mob turned on their new opponents with impunity. However, it appeared that their main goal was to escape, because after trading a few blows, they threw down bombs of thick noxious gas, and vanished.

“We should come go Hell’s Kitchen more often Spidey! They have NINJA!” Deadpool crowed, sheathing his swords.

“Quiet!” growled Daredevil, apparently recovered enough from whatever the gas had done to him.

“Uh, I think the words you’re looking for is ‘Thank you my red compadres, how ever would I have fought off the ninja army without you?’ “

“You let them get away!”

“Well at least they didn’t leave you with a gaping wound-“

Spiderman cut off his partner. “Hey, no fighting. We’re all friends here.” He turned to Daredevil. “We’re sorry. I there anything we can do to help? What with everything happening here lately, you look like you could use it.”

Daredevil scoffed. “Let me guess, you’re working for Stick too.”

“What?”

He shook his hooded head, as if clearing away a concussion. “What you can do is stay out of my city!”

Deadpool laid a hand on his partner’s shoulder. “No need to be so touchy! I’m sure there are enough ninja multitude for everyone-“

Daredevil snarled, teeth bared. “Stay out of Hell’s Kitchen!”

“Rude!”

But the red horned vigilante had already leapt from the roof in the same general direction as the ninja hoard.

Wade crossed his arms petulantly over his chest. “Baby boy, we have got to get you some nicer friends to go out hero-ing with. I don’t like that one’s attitude.”

Peter rolled his eyes, and motioned for the merc to get on his back for them to swing home. Casting one last worried glance over his shoulder, Spiderman leapt from the building, away from Hell’s Kitchen.   
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N: 
> 
> And that’s the first half of DD S2.


	3. Civil Unrest

…

…Civil Unrest

“With the recent successful conviction of the vigilante known as ‘The Punisher’, the public is now wondering whether other vigilantes will soon be facing trial. The new DA is currently in discussion with the mayor of New York City, in order to present what they’re calling a ‘super human registration act’ in order to make litigation against such vigilantes easier. This act will potentially be modeled after the Sokovia Accords, currently being implemented by the United Nations. We take you now to local radio star Patricia Walker, who argues that such a registration is unconstitutional-“

Peter huddled closer to Wade’s side, eyes never leaving the news report playing on his laptop screen.

“So, they want all super types to register with the government, huh?” Fingers played with the short strands of his brown hair. “Think they’ll give us cool jackets, or will it be more like a Costco card scenario?”

“I think it’s more like a license to hero type thing.”

A hum rumbled through the merc’s chest. “Guess we’ll have to push back the wedding. Damn, I finally found a bouquet that matched my dress, and didn’t clash with my suit!”

Wade glanced down when his joke didn’t evoke any laughter, to see his partner tugging at the sleeve of his hoodie.

“It might not be a bad thing,” the smaller man tasted the words slowly. “Having all the vigilantes be known to the public. It would stop people abusing power, and stuff. Probably would stop the guys who don’t know what they’re doing from getting hurt too.”

“Yeah, then what?” Wade shook his head. “No. Nothing good ever happens when you’re put on a list by the government.”

“You sound awfully paranoid.”

He raised a scarred eyebrow. “Did I ever tell you what I used to do when I worked for the fancy suits in the five sided building?”

“From what I understand, all the sentences start with ‘redacted’.”

Wade’s lack of laughter made the tension in the room sink in. His lips twitched mirthlessly. “I went after the people who were on their lists. Nice people, criminals, kids- most of them were scared, and all of them would be more than qualified for whatever this ‘super registration act’ thing.”

“Well, from what it sounded like on the news, this would be for making jails and holding facilities for the criminals and stuff too. And we do need those, if super villains keep happening. I mean, it’s not like a normal jail could hold guys like the Lizard or Electro.”

“Nice things never happen to people with powers in a ‘holding facility’.”

“I guess it can’t be worse than normal jail, just everyone could kill you. Oh wait-“

“Sure, just the same. Except for the team of scientists paid to cut you open to see how you tick, and the dehumanization, and lack of basic human rights, like daytime television.”

“Wade, not everything’s like what Francis did.”

“This wasn’t Francis.” Deadpool’s broad shoulders tensed. “Most of my time working for the government looks like a black Zebra, because I was on a team led by this guy named Striker. We didn’t do nice things to people like us. I jumped ship when he started making a few too many comments about experimenting on my liver, and Sabertooth got too staby. Guess it was karma that I ended up with super powers anyway.”

Peter shifted uncomfortably. “But that’s illegal.”

“If you’re labeled a public danger, they can do whatever they want to you in the name of keeping the peace. And it’s only been a bit more than ten odd years since I left. The guys who ok-ed Striker probably are trying to ok this too.”

The hero bit his lip, knees drawing close to his chest for him to wrap his arms around. Wade leaned against the couch, arms spread over the backrest, watching.

Brown eyes met hazel. “…I think this means we really will have to postpone the wedding. I don’t want to be put in handcuffs before I can kiss the groom.”

“Might want to lay off the late night heroing until this blows over too.”

“But that won’t help anyone. If anything, I should try to do more. Give vigilantism a more positive face. Besides, they haven’t caught me yet.”

“They haven’t used military grade weaponry either.”

Peter sighed, eyes rolling. “Wade.”

The mercenary cuddled to his partner’s side. “We could always jump ship and head north. My French is a bit rusty, but I know enough to find us the best maple syrup in all the land.”

“But all the land up there has the best maple syrup.”

“Your point?”

“We’re not moving to Canada. If things do get bad, we have to help.”

“Yeah, yeah, with great power comes great guilt, or something.” His expression turned considering. “Though I suppose the the Xmen might be willing to give us a space in their secret bunker base. They keep themselves under wraps, but ever since the alien invasion thing, people are more concerned with terrors from the outer reach than racism. Mutant-ism? Whatever ism applies. Anyway, they totally will have a secret bunker we can crash if things go the same way as Ryan Reynold’s acting career.”

“Yeah, well they suck at leaving behind contact information.” Peter knocked his head against the other’s side. “Wade, nothing bad is going to happen to us.”

“Of course it’s not, because I’ll be there.”

Peter uncurled enough to kiss the corner of his mouth, chasing the scowl away. The couple breathed together for a few minutes, silence only broken by the roomba bumping its way across the floor, googly eyes spinning with each collision.

Eventually, Peter sat up with a stretch. “So, if you’re not working tonight, what are your plans?”

A playful twist touched the mercenary’s pot marked face. Red gloved hands tickled the other’s ribs. “Well, I can think of a few things~.”

“Wade!” Peter mock shrieked, and picked up the roomba and shielded the two sides opposite its pair of attached eyes. “Not in front of the baby!”  
…

Later, over a heaping plate of pancakes, Peter clicked through his email, while Wade danced around the stovetop in a frilly apron.

“Well, apparently Nelson and Murdock is going under.”

“Shit. Do we need to find a new lawyer for our license? Because this wedding is still happening eventually.”

“No, Foggy just mailed me. Said he would keep us as his personal clients, since we were so patient with the trouble we went through before. He’s also giving us the option to join up with his new firm.” Peter hummed appreciatively. “Oh, it’s the same guys who defended that PI who claimed to be mind controlled.”

“Jessica Jones? I love that show!”

The hero ignored the nonsensical babble with acquired practice.  
…

“Bad brain day?” Peter said, cuddling up next to the red clad figure.

The normal returning warm touches were absent. “I think I forgot how to emotion.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” He drew back with a chuckle.

Wade continued to stare at his hand. “This was important yesterday, I know it was, but I couldn’t remember why today.”

Peter looked down at the hand too, and felt his heart stutter. Familiar crushed plastic pieces lay in the mercenary’s palm. He took a steadying breath. “It’s all right if you forgot. That’s-“

“The ring I got you when I proposed. I didn’t forget.”

“But you forgot why it was important.”

He side eyed a look at the shorter man. “It’s just plastic. It’s not worth anything, and I could buy you something much nicer now. I know I didn’t because this ring made you happy, and I remember that making you happy is important. I just can’t remember why.”

“It’s because you love me.” Thin fingers dug into the scientists elbows as his arms crossed tightly over his chest. 

“Yeah.” He looked back down at the ring. “But all I can think of is how useful you are when you take care of me and keep me company. I don’t think that was all I thought about yesterday, so this might be another cancer thing.”

Peter tried to take a breath, but it came as more of a sniff. “It’s all right. Tomorrow you’ll be better. You’ll beat the cancer in your brain, and tomorrow you’ll remember.”

“But what if I’m not?” The palm tipped, letting the shards fall to the floor. “What if the bad days outnumber the good, and one day I can’t remember why I like to keep you.”

The shorter man wiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his hoodie. His mind retreated back into the analytical problem solving mode which allowed him to battle a villain while simultaneously figuring out how to take down their assorted dooms day devices. “Then we’ll just have to make sure you don’t.” Unbidden a tiny upturn ghosted across the corners of his lips. “Have you ever seen Fifty First Dates?”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> I’m really liking the idea of Wade still being involved with the Wolverine Origins stuff, just with liberal fannon and cannon alterations….. lets see where this goes.
> 
> Also, brain cancer is scary. Brain anything is scary. Complex hardware breaking down is scary. Poor Wade. Poor Peter.


	4. Trouble and Tacos

… 

Like most healthy couples, Deadpool and Spiderman shared more than just the kinky R-rated kind of bonding. While usually that took the form of eating tacos on the ledges of too tall to be advisable buildings and throwing lettuce at pigeons, occasionally their hectic schedules lined up, allowing them to spend a leisurely night patrolling the city together.

“Is that a jewelry robbery?” Deadpool said, craning his neck to see a pair of black clad criminals run out of a glass fronted building. “Who robs jewelry stores anymore? Everyone knows the real money’s in identity theft!”

Spiderman shrugged, the motion hampered by the strong body clinging to his back, and shot a new web line to redirect their swing back towards the commotion of screaming alarms.

The thieves had just clambered into their getaway car, when a red and black body crashed through the skylight.

“Hola!” Deadpool crowed, elbowing the driver in the face. “You have the right to remain silent!”

A knife to his ribs distracted the mercenary, long enough for the two guys in the back to escape from the vehicle into an alleyway.

“They never want to come quietly.” He sighed to the moaning body in the driver’s seat. The mercenary got out of the car and sauntered to where Spiderman had the two other thieves webbed to a wall. “Good thing I always bring backup!”

The hero scoffed. “Please, you’re my backup.”

Deadpool threw his arms over his partner’s neck and spun them around dramatically. “Oh, I’ll have whatever kinda literal and metaphorical back of yours you want to give me.”

“That was bad. Two outta ten, and that’s just cuz I think you’re cute.”

“Aw, boo-“

But whatever Deadpool was going to say was cut off by the sound of a gun being cocked at the other end of the alleyway. In his arms, Peter twitched, but couldn’t lift his arms fast enough without breaking Wade’s. The mercenary’s arms however-

“Deadpool don’t-!”

-had already raised and pulled the trigger, mask chillingly blank.

The driver, who had unwisely tried to take out his attachers instead of running, fell like a jelly puppet landing head first off the side of a building. Oh well, it was his last mistake.

Spiderman flung himself out of his partner’s arms, nearly dislocating the merc’s shoulder. “Deadpool, what the HELL?”

Against the wall, the two still living thieves squeaked through their web gags.

In the distance sirens, probably alerted by the jewelry store’s alarms, approached.

“Come on Spidey.” The mercenary hustled the hyperventilating hero out of the alleyway. “We gotta go.”

Functioning on autopilot, Spiderman shot out a web line, and swung them back to their apartment. His heavy landing betrayed his displeasure. He shrugged off Deadpool’s hands, and stalked to the kitchen.

Wade sighed, following. “You know I’ve killed people before. I told you, like, the second week we met.”

“Yeah, but-“ Peter pressed his lips together, trying to articulate his thoughts. As always, his partner knew exactly what was on his mind.

“But hearing it and seeing me hit a guy like a party cracker are two totally different things.” His voice was hard underneath the humor.

“Wade…”

“That guy was going to shoot you. I’m not going to apologize for keeping you safe. I prefer you angry at me than dead.”

“I have been doing this for a long time; I am capable of taking care of myself.”

“Well, here’s the great thing baby boy, I can take care of you too.” He reached out a hand to lay on the red web designed shoulder, but Peter flinched back. The black glove froze for half a heartbeat, then curled back to the mercenary’s side.

Peter turned to him apologetically, but Deadpool had already crossed to the closet door, where he pulled out a pink bag and began loading it up with various implements of war.

“Wade, where are you going?”

“Let’s just say I’m going off on a job, and not trying to give you some time to calm your webs?”

“A job? What job?”

“Oh, Weasel called.” Deadpool waved his hand nonchalantly. “Apparently hiring one super powered mercenary to take down a cartel is cheaper than an army, plus the whole plausible deniability thing. I do this, get paid, then you and I head on a vacation to Cabo until this whole Civil War thing blows over. What do you say? Wedding on the beach?”

“You know I don’t like it when you kill people.”

“Petey, these guys gonna die either way. I’m just making sure the money goes to a good home. Mine.”

“But it’s not right! They should be arrested and tried for their crimes!”

“Baby boy, I know you’ve never actually been outside of the state of New York, but do you know anything about the judiciary system of where I’m going? Because they definitely won’t be able to convict these guys.”

“Wade, please. This will make me sad.”

“I remember the video, baby boy, but I also think being able to afford rent and having enough cash to run and keep you from being kidnaped by a government organization for nefarious purposes will go a long way to keeping you happy in the future!”

{Knock knock!}

[Who’s there?]

{Foreshadowing!}

[Foreshadowing who?]

{Foreshadowing five shadows what’s gonna happen in the future!}

Deadpool clutched the side of his head. “Shut up, I’m doing this so that won’t happen!”

“Wade? Are the voices back? Are they telling you you need to do this?” Peter tried to placate the mercenary, hands up like he was approaching a wild stallion. “Do you want me to pick up any anti-psychotics?”

“Baby boy, you know drugs don’t work on me anymore. We’d have to raid an entire hospital’s medicine cabinet for anything to take effect.”

“Will it help you if I do that?”

“So you can steal drugs illegally, but I can’t stop people who sell them? Hypocrite much?” Deadpool zipped up his duffle bag, and sighed. “Look, usually Weasel doesn’t like to mint gold cards for campaigns like this, but he’s been keeping an ear to the ground since I garnered a bit of an extreme reputation while trying to get in touch with Francis, what can I say, I get antsy when a guy doesn’t answer his phone. But, what does it matter? I’m gone for a week or two, I come back with the metaphorical bacon, and we make pancakes.”

“But you’re still killing people. For money.”

“Well it’s no fun killing people without money. Believe me, I’ve tried it.”

“Yes, and you said you would stop after the whole Francis thing!” Peter sighed through his teeth. “Wade, I love you, but I can’t let you go off and kill people.”

“Sure you can. It’s easy!”

A deep growl erupted from the hero’s throat. “I can’t deal with this Wade! The boxes, you wearing the suit everywhere, hell, it’s no problem loving you through that! But I can’t love you when you shoot a guy point blank in front of me!”

“But I won’t /be/ in front of you! I’ll be half way across the continent!”

“And then when you come back, I know I’ll be looking into the eyes of a murderer!”

The mercenary froze. Slowly, ever so slowly, he turned to face the shorter man, who stared at him, eyes red and watery.

“Well, joke’s on you, Spiderman. You already do that every day.”

Peter lurched back as if struck.

Deadpool slung his bag over his shoulder, and marched towards the apartment exit.

“Wade,” the quite voice echoed through the silent space. “Do you love me?”

The mercenary paused at the door. “Always.”

“If you leave this apartment, Wade, you better not be planning on coming back!”

“Then I guess you’ll have to find a new roommate.”

The door slammed.  
…  
..  
.

Rec…  
01:10

“Now listen here!” The camera wobbled as it was brought closer to the red and black mask. “Petey is the most important thing in the world to us, so even if you don’t remember why, you’ll regret it forever if you make him sad.”

“Wade, this is supposed to be a serious video!”

The masked face turned to look at a figure off screen. “I’m being totally serious baby boy.”

Snorting laughter.

Deadpool leaned close to the lens again. “He’s the most important thing to us. So you gotta make sure he stays safe and happy, no matter what.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:
> 
> I know this is a horrible way to end a chapter. This installment was about Wade and Peter re-learning how to live together. It didn’t really work out.


	5. Civil Suit and Spiders

… One month later ...

It started, as all worthwhile things do, with the glorious gluteus of our favorite neighborhood wall crawler.

{Danger Will Robinson Danger!}

[That’s an old reference even for this author, but yeah, there’s a definite disturbance in the force.]

Deadpool let his sword fall from the pose which showed off his spectacular guns, expression blank.

[He can’t still be mad at us for taking the job, right? We were only gone for, like, a month.]

{Well, he hasn’t responded to any of our texts, and apparently has upgraded to a higher circle of heroic friends. So, maybe.}

The merc skulked to the edge of the roof to watch as the red and blue clad figure spoke with the notorious Tony Stark (TM). Lips unreadable through the companies’ various masks, the topic of conversation could only be guessed at, though the friendly gestures and shoulder pats to the spidery hero made it seem positive.

The wall crawler’s shoulders hunched in a familiar humbly pleased posture, and his voice was as perky and light hearted as ever. He used the correct words, cadences, mannerisms- even the uneven stitching on the shoulder of his costume was spot on. By all accounts, the red, white, blue, and webbed figure was Spiderman.

[But dat ass ain’t Spidey’s.]

{Nickel bounce worthy, but nope, not Spidey’s. He’s a silver dollar at minimum.}

The merc’s brows drew together, and he sheathed his weapons. “Sacagawea gold dollar; silver age’s for chumps.”

{I think Silver Age is DC, actually.}

[Well, the author has been writing Flash fandom for a while, cut them some slack. You know, like what we’re not going to give whoever took our Spidey.]

Nodding his head decisively, Deadpool slunk back from the apartment window, figures inside none the wiser to his presence. “I’m onto you, you ass-imposter!” He growled, leaping to the ground. Behind him, he could just hear the excited exclamation Spiderman made to the figure head of New York’s favorite hero team.

{Because everyone knows Fantastic 4 sucked.}

[Couldn’t hold together without Cap. Those abs…yum.]

Deadpool wasn’t listening his box’s banter, fractured mind already assembling a list of people to hit. Hard. With sharp things.  
…

[Is this stalking?]

“I prefer the term recon.”

[So, yes then.]

“It’s for a good cause!”

{Yeah, we’re trying to find out about this ass-imposter!}

[Then what was our excuse when we stalked Spidey at work before this whole plot started?]

{Quiet you.}

[I’m bored, can we get to the killing people now?]

{No, because once we start that, Iron Man will be all over us. Or the Daredevil. Or Frank. Probably Frank. He did just finish his origin story. Though, I’m more worried about Iron Man. Didn’t he sign up with not-SHIELD to host some super secret super-villain prison?}

[We could probably break out.]

{An air tight room at the bottom of the sea says you’re wrong.}

[But we’re trying to save Spidey!]

{They don’t know that!}

“We must be stealthy, like Russian widow.”

[Natasha’s not gonna be happy that we’re borrowing her gimmick.]

{It’s not like she’ll know.}

Deadpool refocused his scope, watching as the brown haired look alike trundle around his apartment. He set about reading some overly complex books thicker than the hero’s arm, and typing a note on his laptop to his lab.

So, nothing sneaky or suspicious.

[I wouldn’t bother doing work if I was disguised as someone for nefarious purposes.]

{Spidey could have just let his gluteus go?}

“Or the ass-imposter doesn’t know that he’s not Spidey.”

[Oo! Is he a robot?]

{My money’s on clone, because I think this universe hasn’t had Skrulls yet.}

The merc packed up his scope and slid down the fire escape, before hoofing it back to his own temporary abode.  
…

[Weapon-X?]

{No, those guys are after us. Besides, we killed Francis.}

[Hydra?]

{SHIELD? Are they still Hydra in this AU?}

[Who cares, this is boring. I hate having to slog through the needless false lead then inevitable discovery and rescue. Let’s just skip to the next chapter where this is already solved. Oh wait, has that been posted yet? Damn.]

“We’ll start with SHIELD.” Deadpool said, cleaning the barrel of his Desert Eagle. His mind always worked best when his hands were busy. Kept his mouth from having room to chatter with him having to concentrate on it. “They’ve got records on all the bad guys poking at people who don’t want to be cut up.”

[Not that they do anything about it, what with being infiltrated, destroyed, then privatized by Tony Stark (TM).]

{Harry should have kicked Dumbledore’s teeth in. ‘Greater Good’ my non-existent ass!}

“Hufflepuff pride!” Deadpool crowed, reassembling the handgun with a snap. 

{Wait, why are we sure that Spidey’s being scienced on?}

[Did you not see the clone?]

“Could be a shape shifter,” Deadpool conceded, unzipping his Hello Kitty bag. “But when has a missing hero ever not been scienced on? We’ve kidnaped enough of them back with Striker to answer that. No matter how you slice it, this smells fishy.”

[I feel like there’s a disproportionate number of evil scientists who like human experimentation. That just scares everyone away from biology! You never hear about evil quantum physicists!]

{I will take over the world with my theoretical model of String Theory! Yeah, no, doesn’t have the same ring as a mutant clone army.}

“As a former table top jigsaw puzzle of a mad scientist, I concur.” He slid his swords lovingly into his back sheaths. “Evil String Theorist doesn’t sound nearly as intimidating.”

[Maybe one day we’ll get equal representation of the STEM fields in comic villainy.]

{But that day is not today!}

“No! Today is he day we ride forth to rescue out spidery damsel in distress!”

[{Huzzah!}]  
…

Deadpool knew his own limitations. He knew when to face defeat at the mechanics of a minivan kiddy-lock; he knew when to admit that his own cooking far exceeded IHOP’s pancake making ability; he knew that he could barely save a word file on a good day, and should really not try and hack a secret spy organization’s hard drive. 

Which was why the tiny SHIELD facility disguised as an accountant firm was currently on fire, and one lucky stooge was given progressively more painful bruises until he caved and gave up his security pass-codes.

[Oo! Top level!]

{That seems awfully convenient…like lazy writing…}

[Shush you!]

The mercenary plugged in a flash drive, scanning the file names as they popped up onto the desktop.

[Called it! See? HYDRA!]

{Can’t be, see? Cap broke into their facilities here, and that didn’t have any cloning stuff, just stuff trying to make more super soldiers, and whatever they were doing in Age of Ultron.}

[Wait, did that happen here? Because if we have Spidey, we’re clearly not following the Marvel Cinematic Universe (TM) continuity.]

{No, it totally did. Didn’t you read the prequel? We were just ankle deep in blood finding Francis. and the new Avengers trailer totally puts our Spidey in universe too, so we’re the only non-cannon element in the story so far. Us and the Xmen.}

[Oh right. I liked the one with the zamboni.]

{Everyone liked the zamboni. Sexy skin here didn’t particularly pay attention to those kinds of major MCU crisis things.}

Deadpool closed that file and opened another, eyes flicking across the screens’ information almost as fast at the tiny hard drive downloaded it.

[Why are we in here? I’m so boo~oored!]

“Because to find a bad guy, you follow the money.”

{And we know what a bad guy needs to buy to do bad science things to little spiders in glass boxes.}

[Crucio!]

{Stop, we already had our Harry Potter reference in this fic! No quoting imposter Mad Eye Moody!}

“Shut up, you guys. I can’t read with all your babbling.”

His eye caught on a discrepant number some SHIELD stooge had noticed in the accounts of one of the big named bad-guy corporations.

{Who spends that much on tacos?}

[Besides us.]

“Well, duh.” Deadpool clicked on the company’s name, scowl twisting his face past the point of monstrous.

“IGH?”

{Of fucking course. Jessica Jones has been mentioned too many times in this fic for it not to be a major plot point!}

[Told you we should have just skipped to the last chapter. Would have saved so much time.]

Sirens blared in the distance.

“Hold that thought, we gotta jet!” The mercenary sang, snatching the hard drive from the computer and leaping through the plate glass.

{We’ll be feeling that tomorrow.}

[No we won’t.]  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N: Well, I’ve thoroughly leapt down the fannon plot hole. Leave a white rabbit on your way out.


	6. Radio Stars

… 

“Hi, this is Peter! I can’t come to the phone right now, but leave a message after the tone, and I’ll get back to you when I can. And if this is that guys who keeps calling me leaving heavy breathing on the line, and you got past my blocking your number again, seriously, stop it.”

Beep!

Wade threw the phone away. It landed hard in the corner of his apartment, screen cracking against the floor. He pressed his forehead against the wall, and rhythmically began beating a tick into the brick. Papers and tacks fluttered with every movement, spidery lines of red string knotting haphazardly from one point to the next.

[We really need help.]

{I think we’re making progress destroying the wall with our skull at least.}

[It’s been days since we got home and saw the Spidey-Imposter, and we’re not any closer to finding our boo.]

{Unless that is our boo, and he just doesn’t want to see us.}

[You shut your cake hole!]

{Please, as if cake has been anywhere near any of our holes.}

[Either way, we need help finding him. Didn’t we agree to join the Xmen that time Colossus and Negasonic Teenage Warhead helped us find our boo?]

{Yeah, well, we’ll just say we kept missing their calls. Besides, they never sent us a friend request, so they can’t blame us for not joining them at the clubhouse.} 

[But we could ask them for help looking for Spidey.]

{We already tried calling Logan, and he threatened to cut our head off again. Besides, I think they have their own problems with the registration act thing. Didn’t we see Professor X talking to Congress on TV yesterday?}

[Ok, well what about Spidey’s sewer mutant friends? They could help us.]

{They fell off the grid ages ago. Remember when our boo explained his epic adventure to find us, and when we tried to send a gift basket down Callisto’s way, all we found was lots of broken things?}

[Oh yeah, there were a bunch of collapsed streets people said were from gas explosions underground.]

{So, even if they were alive, I think they might find their own problems more pressing than ours. Logan thought we were crazy too, and said we shouldn’t be making up conspiracy theories because of a bad breakup.}

“Quiet, I’m trying to sleuth.”

[You just pasted new pictures over your Francis Wall.]

Deadpool stabbed a knife through a tacked up picture of Tony Stark (TM), attached to the web surrounding a news clip of Spiderman standing at some press conference with Stark’s divorce-settlement half of the Avengers by a red string. “Don’t question my methods.”

{Maybe Spidey just doesn’t want us any more.}

[Couldn’t blame him, really. With a mug shot like ours-]

“Peter wouldn’t do that.”

{He did tell us not to come back if we left on that job.}

“Shut up.”

[Maybe him joining up with Stark’s pro-registration kick is just to spite us.]

“Shut. Up.”

{Yeah, maybe him not answering our calls and not recognizing us when we tried to talk to him at the apartment is because he’s just really really mad at us.}

[Him screaming and kicking us off the top of the apartment totally would support that theory-]

A red and black fist punched through the drywall. “SHUT. UP.”

[…Rude.]

{Yeah, see how you like it in your head without us here. Spoilers, it’s awful.}

Deadpool pressed his skull between his fists, forehead lightly hammering a dent in the wall. “That guy’s not our Petey. He’s not. He can’t be.”

Breath rattled through the mercenary’s chest, incrementally descending from the ledge of hyperventilation back to an intense hollow roar, like wind in a cave.

Pulling back to examine the wall once more, Deadpool rolled a red thread between his fingers and traced it from a cartoon depiction of a library exploding to a fan of potential perps. Some, such as SHIELD, HYDRA (?), and Oscorps had been ruthlessly stabbed through. The others…

Black gloved fingers tapped the wall twice. “Looks like we’re breaking and entering. Again.”  
…

The IRS building Wade broke into had a ton of staff which were (mostly) more than willing to help the mercenary find out where the nearest IGH office was. Luckily, the potentially evil organization had a building a few streets from Hell’s Kitchen, which had appeared after they recently gave funding to the Metro General Hospital, for suspiciously vague reasons.

Thanking the helpful evening staff, and only firing three warning shots into the ceiling, Wade brushed the dust off his super special secret spy gear, which hadn’t seen the light of night since his rather abrupt retirement from Striker’s team of misfits, and prepared to storm the castle.

However, when he discreetly made his way into the security room ( [because the best place to start is turning off the cameras when trying to be sneaky] ), it was to find someone already there.

Wade squinted suspiciously at the security monitor, where a blonde woman picked her way through a hall.

He picked up the still bleeding head of the guard. “Can you believe this amateur? She wearing Nike’s to sneak. Seriously, everyone knows you go for high top sneakers when sneaking, honestly.”

Spinning the sword around his wrist and back into its sheath, Deadpool picked up the obligatory fire safety map with labeled exits off the side of the door, and navigated his way to the other burglar. 

Three floors later, and he heard her shoes squeaking against the linoleum just inside the same records room Deadpool had planned to pilfer. He positioned himself against the doorframe like a french painting.

“You’re new to the whole breaking and entering thing, aren’t you?”

The woman started, but the mercenary admired her novice form at being able to pull a gun from her pocket while turning to face her querent. Not fast enough, of course, but good enough for someone who clearly hadn’t had any sort of official training to handle firearms. 

Deadpool turned his wrist, letting the light glint off the side of his Desert Eagle. “I’m sorry, I had this bee en ee scheduled for a while now, so I’m gonna have to ask you to leave. I don’t like sharing these special moments without my boo.”

“Who are you?” Foxy blonde said, not letting the tremor in her still raised hands reach her voice.

“It’s rude to ask for a name without introducing yourself first.”

The woman squared her shoulders. “I’m Trish.”

“Oh em gee, from the radio show!” Wade squealed. “We knew we recognized your voice! We love you! Can we have your autograph?”

A thousand photograph smile plastered itself onto her face with ease, and the gun in her hand lowered as the frightening masked man moved into the familiar category of ‘fan’. “Sure thing. Though, maybe at another time?”

The mercenary shook his head. “Right. I mean, where are we going to find a pen and paper while sneaking through some evil villain’s base?”

Trish kept her voice low, as if by being conscious of their possible discovery, she could get the man to follow her example. “Later for sure. How about for now, you help me get these files out of here?”

“Sure thing!” He saluted her with a sword, before returning it to its sheath. He turned to pick up a file box, but looked back over his shoulder. “I’m Deadpool, bee tee dubs.”

Trish looked over from where she was hunched over the dusty computer screen in the corner, smile more genuine than before. “Nice to meet you.”

“Ooo! Are you secretly a techno wizard able to hack the hardest of fire walls?”

“No.” She pulled a USB drive out of her pocket and plugged it into the computer. “But it’s amazing what you can pay for.”  
…

Trish was adorable. Wade wanted to wrap her well meaning little earnest self up and set her free to roam the soft core criminal life of New York like a majestic box of kittens.

While she loaded up her tiny rental with an obscene number of file boxes overflowing with potential paper trails, Deadpool discreetly set the timer of the plastique presents he had seeded the IGH building with earlier. 

He had spent all of the previous week planting a trail of destruction through the city, mimicking the patterns of a budding arsonist. With the city so full of heroes and villains, a string of unexplained crimes suddenly stoping wouldn’t go too questioned. He planned to set two more in Hell’s Kitchen before stoping. Hopefully, they would shrug this establishment’s explosive destruction as a random hit, instead of getting suspicious and wary. 

“Deadpool, you coming?” Trish hissed.

“Aye captain!” He said, setting the timer for one hour, and sliding into the shotgun seat.

“So,” she started, as they navigated their way from the scene of the crime. “Can I ask why you were breaking into a biotech company?”

“Can I ask you?”

“Sure.” The woman said, completely unfazed. “I’m trying to find out about some medical experiments they did a few years ago. The files I had were full of holes. I needed more information.”

“So you decided to commit a felony. A woman after my own heart!” Deadpool swooned dramatically. “Let me guess, tragic childhood, got sick, they gave you an offer you can’t refuse, and you wake up later with a third arm and medical scars?”

She risked taking her eye off traffic long enough to shoot him a brow raised glance. “Close enough.”

“Well, you showed me yours, so I guess I should show you mine.” Deadpool stretched theatrically, settling his arm over the back of the seat. “My boo got snapped up by some not too smart nefarious types, and I’m trying to find him.”

“And your husband is…special too?”

He smirked at her through his mask. “Well, he doesn’t ride the short bus, if that’s what you’re asking.”

The radio star drove them across town to a ritzy apartment. Deadpool wondered if he should inform his little clowder of kittens the danger of inviting a masked man into her home, but decided it was none of his business, as he helped her unload boxes into the elevator.

Surveying the mountain of boxes and flash drives, the mercenary hung his head. “All this research is really gonna hurt my thinker boxes.”

{It burns us like holy water!}

[Amen.]

Trish’s smile was of the same vein one might wear when watching a puppy trying to drag something three times its size up the stairs. “That’s ok Deadpool. How about you go rest on the couch, and I’ll finish up here.”

“You sure?” He asked, already half way to the sofa.

The woman chuckled, and waved him off.

“She’s like the Oracle to my Batman.” Deadpool muttered, easing himself back onto the cushions.

[Are we allowed to reference DC?]

{Who cares, it’s fanfiction. If the fourth wall is still there, we’re not doing our jobs right.}

Wade folded his arms behind his head, trying to twist his neck uncomfortably enough to keep his body from succumbing to the mounting number of sleepless days weighing behind his eyelids. He leaned back into the feather couch, breath evening despite his best efforts. He closed his eyes for a blink-

“Deadpool?” Trish was standing on the opposite side of the room as she called out his name, evidentially well aware of how foolish it was to shake the shoulder of strange vigilantes sleeping on her couch.

The merc tucked his gun back into his belt, hands raising apologetically. “Hey! Sorry! I’m a bit jumpy.”

“It’s all right,” the blonde assured. “I just wanted to show you what I’ve found so far.”

Getting up with a theatrical stretch that cracked all down his spine, Deadpool crossed to where his partner in crime hunched over her computer. The sun was setting where it had been dark before, and several dried coffee rings spotted the table around her research nest.

The woman relinquished her seat with a yawn, and rubbed at the bags under her eyes, as she crossed to the kitchen to make another pot. 

Scrolling through the screen, the merc scowled. “IGH again?”

[Ten bucks says they’re HYDRA.]

{No bet till after Jessica Jones S2 aires.}

[Ok, then put another ten on them competing with HYDRA for best villainous corporation award, or something.]

{Oh, you’re thinking that they made clone Spidey to spy on the good guys and the bad guys. Huh. That would be a really interesting plot twist!}

Wade’s eyes turned to ice as he looked through her files.

[…they were doing that to kids?]

{And I thought we were evil.}

[We’re not. We’re an anti hero, with flexible morals.]

{Whatever.}

[So apparently IGH is just some weird science-y derivative of the mutant growth hormone we were shot up with. Just more super soldier-y so they don’t get fun cracker jack prizes like us, or guys with spikes growing out of their backs.]

{That was surprisingly well thought out for you.}

[Thanks! I’m the two brain cells beauty spot here never bothers to rub together.]

“Hey, I resemble that comment.”

“What?” Trish poked her head over the kitchen counter, from where she stared zombi-like at the percolating coffee maker.

“Nothing! Just talking to myself.” Wade said with a wave of his hand.

She blinked twice, lips drooping in a frown, before turning back to the pot. “Ok.”

[She’s adorable.]

{But back to reading.}

Deadpool clicked open another file. “Killbrew.”

{Why does that name sound ominous?}

[Yeah, we haven’t technically met him in this AU, just his crony Francis.]

{You’re messing up fannon and cannon and movie adaptation again.}

[Well, it’s still not Weapon-X.]

{Fine, you were right on a technicality. But they all definitely know each other.}

“Wow, this guy gets around more than a bong in a frat house.”

“You get to how IGH sponsors a bunch of other labs under an alias yet?” Trish returned to the table, two black cups of coffee in her hand. She offered one to Deadpool, who politely declined, before pulling up another chair beside his.

“Not yet, but maybe you should just give me the cliff notes.”

Trish rubbed her eyes and sighed, leaning back in her chair. “These guys are like ghosts. They’ve got their hands in pretty much every medical sector I’ve been able to find, and have a bunch of private biotechnology research centers across the country. There’s another corporation they’re connected to over seas, but I’m pretty sure it’s a shell, so IGH still owns everything they do.”

White covered eyes narrowed. “Give me a list of the locations you have for everything.”

“You going to check them out?” She said, already clicking print on her computer.

“Yes.”

“Well, I’m glad I could help a hero do his job,” she said, handing over a sheaf of papers.

[Think we should tell her?]

{And break her innocent little heart? You monster!}

Deadpool smiled broadly enough to crinkle the corners of his masked eyes, and wrapped the petite blonde in a carefully calibrated to be snug, but not crushing, hug. “I couldn’t have done it without you. You make a good sidekick!”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Wade and Trish, the broTP no one asked for.


	7. Of Spiders and Men

…

Deadpool was very good at cleaning. He made sure to always use the most effective products, and to close off all those sneaky little crevices vermin might try to flee through. Every room was methodically checked and filth wiped out with prejudice. When new and unexpected corridors were discovered in the false basement levels, Deadpool was professional enough to remember to bring doubles of everything, thus easily ran through those levels like he had those above. He didn’t even forget his Hello Kitty amo bag this time.

Flicking his sword free of a unfortunate IGH facility guard, Deadpool swiped his way through another heavily reinforced door with a stolen keycard. 

[Good thing our first stop was security.]

{Alarms do tend to alert people of our presence.}

“Makes the job less fun.” Sword trailing an inch above the ground, the mercenary stalked down the hallway, glancing through the circular glass windows attached to more unbreakable doors lining the walls.

Most were empty, with the kind of expectant disinfected quality an asylum might greet someone committed against their own wishes. One had rather deep gouges on every surface, who’s four striped orientation might line up with a human hand, if said hand was twice the average size. A few had bodies inside, though judging by the obvious bullet holes in the temples, they weren’t alive anymore.

[Looks like we weren’t as sneaky as we thought, if they were starting to clean up their messes before anyone else could see.]

{Ten bucks says this place has a self destruct button somewhere.}

He paused at the last window.

[He’s not in here.]

{But he was, look at the pretty webs!}

[But our Spidey doesn’t spin webs, he’s Andrew not Toby!]

Deadpool’s eyes narrowed as he took in the torn silken strands, as if someone had roughly cut their way through someone else’s attempt to build a shelter inside a steel box. The furthest corner from the door was white with cobwebs, just the right size for a desperate body to curl up inside, like an unreachable hammock.

{I don’t like this.}

Fingers tapping on the hilt of his sword, Deadpool crossed to the door at the other end of the cell block. It was already ajar when he pushed it open.

Deadpool pulled the trigger before he consciously registered the handful of scientists crowded around a gurney. The body tied down with tubes and chains didn’t even twitch at the gunfire, skin practically blending with the white sheets.

Gently, Wade tucked his weapons away and began pulling IVs out of veins. He was careful not to jostle the bruised skin, where too many needles had carelessly resided. When the last mysterious chemical drip was plucked away, the body groaned.

Eyes flicked under near transparent lids, cracking open to reveal brilliant brown, which roved blearily around the hall. They settled on the red mask, blinking uncomprehendingly. “W-wade?”

“Hey Petey,” the merc said, gently lifting the man’s limp shoulder’s.

[We’ll kill them all.]

{You’re ruining the moment!}

“Shush.” Deadpool’s head twitched to the side, before focusing back on the figure in his arms. “I had to do some research while looking for you. Please don’t be mad, it was for a good cause!”

“Wade,” Peter moaned. “You’re here. Are you really here? I’m not-“

He tried to lift his hand, and Deadpool met him half way, entwining their fingers. “Course I’m here, baby boy.” He kissed the pale knuckles. “The real question is, why are you here? I can’t leave you alone for ten minutes, can I?”

“Please don’t.” Closely clipped brown hair scratched against red leather, as Peter turned his face into Wade’s chest. “I can’t manage even five without you.” He nuzzled closer. “Hm, I like your heart beat…”

{You’re the reason it keeps beating.}

[Was that a quote from something?]

{Eh, probably.}

Wade’s head twitched to the side. “Shush!”

In his arms, Peter’s blinks became less lethargic. “Wade?”

“I’m still here, baby boy.”

A careful palm rose to rest against his masked cheek, thumb rubbing the seam under his eye. “You are. Actually here.” He flung his arms around the mercenary’s neck, breath hitching. “I can’t- You found me! They said no one would even know I was gone-“

“Well they don’t know what they’re talking about, and now they’re dead, so who cares about what they said?” Wade squeezed the disconcertingly weak body back. His forehead brushed his love’s. “I knew it wasn’t you. I knew you were in trouble. I knew it.”

“You found me.”

“I’ll always find you. That sounded less stalker-y and more romantic in my head, but if Le Mis fanfiction has taught me anything, it’s that both of those things can exist at the same time.” Peter chuckled, grip around Deadpool’s neck tightening, before he let go, seemingly strong enough to sit up under his own power. “Now let’s get you out of mad science camp. And I wanna hear all of your dirty band camp stories when we get home.”

“Well, this time they wanted more s-samples.” Peter’s voice was too flat as he rubbed puncture marks on his neck and arms. He breathed evenly, throwing the needles still on the gurney to the floor with a vicious flick of his wrist. “So they didn’t have to start from scratch after shutting this facility down.”

The metal bar of the gurney under Wade’s fists creaked ominously.

“Here’s to hoping that they didn’t decide to send my cells to other evil labs around the world.” Peter continued with fractured cheer. “I really don’t want to be the HeLa of evil biotech.”

Carefully, the spidery man let his bare feet touch the cold steel floor. Waiting a moment to be sure that his legs would hold his weight, he shakily stood, arms straining as he propped himself against the gurney.

Wade moved to support him, but Peter brushed him off. “No riding off into the sunset yet, my black knight! The mission is not yet done!” Determined glint in his feverish eye, Peter began limping down the hall. “We have to get the babies!”

“What?”

Wade obligingly scooped the delirious figure into his arms. “Slow down Spidey. What babies?”

The hero panted with the effort of walking even a short way, his face turned into the neck of the other’s red suit. “Mine. They…made them from me.”

{Burr, it’s suddenly chilly in here.}

[That’s just the metaphorical ice dripping down Mr. Handsome here’s spine.]

Peter directed them to another lab with a familiarity Wade didn’t want to contemplate. When the steel doors slid open to reveal blinking equipment, the hero didn’t even let out a token protest as Deadpool shot down the startled contingent of guards and people in white lab coats. 

He wriggled himself from the mercenary’s arms to stumble through the spreading puddles of blood to the line of five plexiglass boxes. Pale hands stuttered over the first two, mouth twisting in a silent scream at whatever he found. Wade stalked to his side, but was brushed off as Peter turned to the last three.

“They didn’t get to them yet,” he breathed, pressing his palms against the cold material.

Deadpool glanced past the red eyed brunette to see a miniature human wriggling on a white blanket inside the box, nose scrunching familiarly as it squinted against the light. Two other matched set of soft huffs and grumbles indicated the occupants of the other two boxes were still kicking as well.

“We got anything to carry the babies out in? Because I’ve only got two hands, and one is reserved to drag your ass out of here.”

Peter’s laugh was breathy and pain filled, barely a shadow of what the mercenary knew him capable of.

“So, that’s a convenient seg-way into my next surprise I was going to tell you: I can make silk now, like a real spider. I think it’s from the mutant growth hormone stuff I got shot with last year.”

“But you were shot full of MGH like….over five chapters ago! It didn’t do anything to you then!”

“I guess I found this kidnapping slightly more stressful than my last.” He cleared his throat. “The science goons said I have a one in a billion mutation in my transposons that make my DNA freakishly good at incorporating new information.”

He hacked out a cough, and reached a hand to the space under his tongue, mouth working as if he was chewing gum.

“Nearest I can tell, I grew a bunch of silk glands next to my thyroid,” he mumbled through his teeth, drawing a thin gossamer thread free from his lips. “Useless for web slinging, great for making nests and nets.”

“Never thought you were up for arts and crafts,” Wade said carefully, as Peter wove the threads from his lips into an orb web with frightening ease.

“They didn’t exactly give me a tennis ball to play with in that box.” He hummed, plucking at the fibers, before judging them to be sound, and starting on another web. “And my aunt did teach me how to sew. Who do you think made my first costumes?”

“Fair enough.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Possible trigger warning. Seriously, if you haven’t been preparing yourself for some freaky human rights violations with the buildup i’ve been setting, I dunno what to tell you.


	8. Nesting

The stolen van trundled over backwater dirt roads, lulling the nest of spiders curled up in the back into an uneasy sleep. Peter had tried to argue for a position in the front seat, but Deadpool had shot him down, while tactfully not mentioning the dark bags under the hero’s eyes.

[We should have made them hurt more.]

{But we found Spidey! We should be happy!}

[We would be happier if we did more than light the building on fire before we left.]

{Well, Spidey seemed happy when we did that!}

[He’s still probably in shock. They had him for a while. We should have made them hurt more.]

{Don’t worry be happy~ Do dododo dededede duh duh duh~}

The mercenary hummed along to the song bouncing around the inside of his skull, hands tapping intermittently against the steering wheel.

Rustling in the back seat alerted him to the object of his thought’s waking. Near painful gasps along with half muffled whimpers that made the leather on Wade’s hands creak, echoed through the small space.

“Wade?”

“You awake baby boy?” Deadpool said, ratcheting up his cheer dial to eleven.

Pale hands crept over the head rest of the opposite seat, pulling the exhausted frame into view, until Peter could hold himself up. “Where are we going?”

Wade hummed, half his attention still on the road. “Spidey version two point oh has been camping out at our apartment. Apparently, someone neglected to tell him that he had a roommate, so I’ve been holed up in the old house with Al.”

“How has she been?

“Same old. Snarky, bad taste in Ikea, blind.”

A weak chuckle as Peter slumped against the plastic covered seat. Wade risked brushing a hand along his bruised elbow. 

“Why don’t you go back to sleep. We’ll be there in a few hours, because of course those evil science dudes had their lab in the middle of po-dunk nowhere.”

“Hm~.” Peter leaned into the touch minutely, before retiring back.

Leather covered hands tapped fervently against the steering wheel, as the driver strained his ears to listen to four slow even breaths.  
…

They arrived at the shack in the twilight hours of the morning. Wade gently carried Peter and the babies into his room, where he bundled them up onto the bed.

Checking his phone he found a missed call from Al, informing him that the old woman was off visiting some friends who sounded suspiciously like crack dealers. Wade didn’t much care, as it kept her out of his metaphorical hair for the foreseeable future.

Casting another half glance at the slumbering spiders, he retired to the kitchen and began pulling out the fixings for breakfast.

Much later, when Wade risked peering back in to check on his boo, arms laden with a tray of pancakes, it was to find Peter and the clones gone. A silk hammock hung from the close bedroom walls in their place.

Putting down the food, Wade plucked at the webbing. The cocoon shifted, and a few threads moved aside to show his favorite brunette sleepily looking out. “Permission to come aboard captain?”

Brown eyes blinked blearily, expression muzzy. Wade kissed his cheek, prompting a contented sigh and welcoming nuzzle. A pale arm reached out pluck at the corners of Deadpool’s mask, which he obligingly lifted.

Peter’s fingers had always had the faintest texture of Velcro, corresponding, Wade assumed, with his spider powers to stick to walls. The mercenary had always used the severity of the sensation as an indicator of the hero’s distress. When last they had touched, all those weeks ago during their fight, it had felt like sandpaper. Now, the drag of skin on skin pulled and tickled like prickly bristles. 

Wade caught the hand once it finished its exploration of his face, and kissed the pale wrist. Pulling off his gloves with his teeth, his scared fingers stroked the crook of the other’s arm. Many dark thoughts crowded for attention behind his eyes, but he settled on the least disturbing answer he could expect. “So, how much blood did they take to make your clones?”

“You can’t make a clone using blood, dear. Blood cells don’t have nuclei.” Peter said, voice low. “You get a gamete donor and an egg, then you replace the egg’s chromosome with gametes from the donor. Then you combine them together, and you’ve got a zygote.”

His head rolled to press against his extended shoulder. “What these guys developed was a method to encourage cell growth and aging in mammals with an engineered operon in that activated in the presence of a stimulant. They could go from a baby to an old man in under a day.” His voice cracked. “And apparently my mutation caused the formula to behave differently than the initial tests, so they wanted to test exposure level effects.”

The mercenary’s muscles turned rigid, the only thing preventing him from violence being his proximity to his love. “We should have killed them slower for you.”

“…Can we not talk about that.”

From inside the nest, a trio of grumbles and angry coos burbled. Peter’s attention shifted, as he used his free arm to comfort the clones back into drowsy silence.

“So, what are we going to do about them?”

Brown eyes ticket to hazel, before darting back into the nest. “I know we never talked about… but I’m not just going to leave this responsibility on someone else, especially if they might hurt them, and-“ He took a shuddering breath. “I want to keep them.

“I’ve always wanted to be a mommy!” Wade gushed.

“They might not live very long.” Peter’s voice was strained with caution. “I don’t know if they did anything else to them.”

“Then we’ll make sure what time they have is awesome.” The mercenary assured, wrapping his arms as much as he could around the agitated spider.

The hero hummed tiredly, shifting so that he pressed closer to the other.

Wade tapped his cheek twice. “Here, scoot over.”

Testing the fortitude of the web, the mercenary wriggled himself into the cramped nest. Fibers stretched to accommodate the added body, as he maneuvered his arms around the sleeping figures. The cocoon resealed itself like a blanket falling closed, surrounding the tiny family in soft white.

Two small bodies rolled into his arms as the group settled. One of the clones yawned, and pawned at the stitching of his costume. Deadpool’s gaze softened. “We should name them.”

Peter snuggled into his side, arms full of a snoozing child. “Hm, I like Ben.” He squeezed the littlest one in his lap.

Wade nuzzled the biggest one tucked in his right arm. “Then this one’s gonna be Miguel Bea.” He switched his affection to the middle sized baby in his left. “And this one called dibs on Kaine Arthur, because Citizen Kaine is an awesome movie, and his stripper name can be Rose Bud.” 

The spider hero snorted. “Deciding his future career already? Don’t you think he’s a bit young?”

“Everyone has a stripper name, Spidey.” The merc said, rolling his eyes dramatically.

“Oh yeah? What’s mine?”

“Spider-monkey. And I’m your partner, Dead-Sexy.”

“We should totally start up a superhuman porn site on the internet. You know, before being superhuman becomes illegal.”

A ripple of tension snapped through the mercenary’s body, before he forcibly calmed it again. “You’ve been at science camp for a while, baby boy. It already is.”

“…oh.” Peter turned his face till it was buried in Wade’s shoulder. “Anything else I missed?”

“Yeah, the last season of Mad Men got cray cray.”

In the dim glow of light filtering through the webbing, gabbing about the latest episodes of inane television, Wade felt content for the first time in months.  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wade’s totally the mommy, he’s got the legs for a dress.


	9. They grow up so fast

…

By the next day, Miguel already looked like a gangly teenager, and Kaine was teething. Benny stayed just as they found him, and Peter hypothesized that he was the control, thus not exposed to any of the growth factor the others were.

The couple hadn’t slept at all the night before, too busy cuddling the whimpering kids. Wade kept up a steady stream of chatter through until dawn, his scarred fingers alternately carding through each of the spiders’s hair.

There must have been some other side effects to the advanced aging process, because by morning, Miguel had absorbed Deadpool’s chatter like a sponge, and powered through his achy muscles to bounce around the walls like a loquacious kangaroo.

“I was worried they might not age mentally in proportion with their bodies.” Peter confided, while drawing soothing circles on the kid’s back with a hand. “I heard one of the lab goons mention something about increasing mental plasticity in the next ‘batch’ to be more compatible for ‘the chair programming’. Whatever that meant. Maybe that’s why they understand us?”

The merc hummed neutrally, tickling Miguel’s nose. “We should take them to the park after pancakes.”

They tucked the adolescent into a set of Peter’s clothes, which hung baggily around his thin frame, but didn’t look too bad. Benny and Kaine wore shrunken T-shirts with purple, blue, and red stains from having met a certain Spiderman costume in the wash. 

Wade refitted his sword holders into a baby carrier, with some clever use of kevlar and string. Benny didn’t seem to mind the slap-shod device when he was put inside, too distracted by the fluffy pink unicorn he was trying to gnaw the eyes off. Kaine was balanced on the merc’s hip, and Peter held a shaking Miguel’s hand securely in his own. 

Taking a deep breath, the family exited the tiny house and clambered into the van to take them to Central Park.

They did everything they might never have a chance to do again.

It was a week day, so finding a relatively secluded section of the park was not too difficult. Wade dug up a nerf football from somewhere, and Miguel took to his improvised lessons in catch like a fish to water. Peter’s sides ached with laughter, where he sat on a picnic blanket with his camera and Benny, Kaine having toddled off to join his sibling.

That night, the eldest clones were treated to a home cooked meal, which covered the tiny kitchen in pasta sauce and taco fillings, and the couple called in culinary wonders from every corner of the takeout world when that didn’t prove to be enough.  
…

The second day, they returned to Central Park, this time to ogle animals at the zoo. 

Kaine was clad in yesterday’s spotty shirt and a pair of too big boxers, just visible under the shirt’s edge. Peter bought him a pair a flip-flops, which the little boy took great pleasure in smacking against the back of his feet with each step. 

Miguel had grown into his hand me downs, and kept grinning madly whenever people asked if he and Peter were twins. The hero would gulp down the lump in his throat, and say that of course they were. Wade knew even without meeting his eyes that they would be shiny with tears.

The family got a few odd looks for Benny’s jerry-rigged carrier and Wade’s mask, but they ignored it with long practice. Miguel and Kaine, more comfortable with people than the day before, regarded the strangers as unimportant, and didn’t notice while ogling the meerkats and horses.  
…

The third day, Miguel’s hair was peppered with grey, and Kaine was half way through losing his baby teeth.

When the eldest clone asked to go to the zoo again, his parents couldn’t say no. Afterwards, they sailed little boats across the nearby pond until sunset.

When they asked why Peter was so quiet, the hero could only hug the boys and say it was nothing.  
…

The fourth day, Kaine’s baby fat began to lose shape to developing cheek bones, and Miguel’s hair was completely silver.

Peter’s body still ached from his poor treatment in the lab, but rallied his strength to take the boys web slinging through his old haunt in Queens until his arms ached. Wade, probably using several pounds of explosives and threats to national security, got the family tickets to see Spamalot and Hamilton on Broadway. While Peter didn’t usually pay attention to musicals, the sheer excitement on the kids’s faces made up for his own theatrical ignorance.  
…

The fifth day, Miguel couldn’t get out of bed, so the family had another culinary explosion. Kaine, who’s face was peppered with spots of teenage acne, held Benny while his parents flitted about the house like butterflies. His usual smile was replaced by weary comprehension, which slid to acceptance as the day drew on.  
…

The sixth day, Kaine held his littlest brother tightly to his chest, sitting at the foot of the massive bed the rest of his family congregated around.

“Mommy, I’m scared.” Miguel whispered, voice cracked with the weight of his withering bones.

Wade held his poor boy close, fingers carding through the white hair. “It’s ok. We’re here. We’re not going anywhere.”

“But I am.” Tears dripped from the corners of his eyes. “And I don’t want to.”

“Death’s a nice lady; she’s always happy to see people. She’s got the nicest voice you’ve ever heard, it sounds like a hug after a long long day. And she’s always happy to take you away from whatever’s hurtin you.”

“But where does she take me?”

“I dunno, but she wouldn’t be smiling like that unless it was someplace nice.”

The clone’s breathing gradually grew shallower. As the late afternoon sun began to lengthen the shadows, Peter ushered the younger children from the room, valiantly trying to brush the tears from his eyes before they fell.

“When I die, you’re not allowed to do that,” Kaine said, as his predecessor made him a sandwich.

“Kenny, baby.” Peter’s voice hitched. “You’re not going to die.”

The clone huffed in an all too familiar manner, and turned his scowling face to his progenitor. “Everyone dies, Mommy said so.”

The glass in Peter’s hand cracked, and he quickly put down the jam jar to steady his breath. “Then let’s make a deal, I’ll not cry when you die, so long as you die long after I die. Ok?”

Kaine considered this, before nodding, and readjusting his grip of a dozing Benny. “All right.”  
…

On the seventh day, Miguel’s ashes were discreetly buried in the plot of ground sectioned off for the Parker Family, between his great aunt and uncle. 

Kaine was resigned to spending the next few years with a face resembling a victim of boils. His parents couldn’t be happier.  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> This got really sad, but when science goes wrong, it goes wrong. So, don’t be evil! You can leave your tears in the comments on your way out.


	10. The Lone Avacado

…

“I think we can risk moving back into the main city,” Peter said one day over breakfast.

“Really?” Kaine squawked, face smeared with maple syrup. 

Wade slid two more pancakes onto the clone’s plate, before returning to the stove. “Hold your horses Rose Bud, we’re not going anywhere till you finish your food.”

The teen immediately stuffed a loaded forkful into his cheeks like a chipmunk, and gulped it down. His rabid attention lashed out to his progenitor, who was calmly feeding apple sauce to Benny. The baby wriggled on his improvised high chair of phone books, reacting to his brother’s energy.

“But after? After can we move there?”

Peter chuckled. “Why are you so excited?”

“I wanna go to school!” the clone crowed. “Like on TV!”

The parents exchanged a wary glance.

“But you only just learned how to read last week.” Peter tried to placate, but Kaine blundered on.

“I already read all the books we have though!” He widened his eyes in a pleading manor Wade had long known to be dangerous. “Please Dad? I wanna go make friends!”

“High School’s not as fun as they make it out on TV…” Peter tried again, but in his heart he had already caved.

“Ple~ase?” 

Wade clicked off the stove and joined the discussion at the table, plate of food in hand. “Come on Petey, he’s gotta learn disappointment and soul crushing drudgery at some point in his life.”

Kaine beamed at his other parent. Peter sighed. 

“We’ll see what we can do.”

The clone cheered, arms pumping in the air with enough fervor to do Wade proud.

“But!” Peter continued. “You’re going to have to keep good grades, and if there’s any trouble, your mommy and I will pull you straight out. Ok?”

“Yes~!” Kaine crowed again. “Can I go and start packing?”

“When you’re done eating.” Wade chided.

Three seconds later, the teenager had stuffed the remaining pancakes into his mouth with the hunger of a black hole, and practically bounced off the wall in his eagerness to get to his room, which consisted of a curtained off portion of the living area. Benny slept in a dresser drawer in Wade’s old bedroom, beside his parent’s large bed.

“I don’t know why I bother to make things that taste good, if that boy’s only going to inhale it.” Wade lamented, pouring copious amounts of syrup onto his own plate.

Peter chuckled, navigating Benny through another bite of food. “He gets his enthusiasm from you.”

The baby began fussing, and Peter tucked him against his shoulder until he quieted.

Wade watched them, mouth flat. “The clone paling around with the Avengers kicked it, apparently.”

Peter paused in his soothing bouncing, before sitting Benny back at the table. “Think they’ll freak if I go swinging around?”

“Probably.”

“Guess I’ll have to avoid that side of town.” He sighed. “It’s not like I ever patrolled much near Stark Tower anyway.”

“Think we can move back into the old apartment? Or maybe we should get someplace bigger, so the boys can have a room to themselves.”

“Uh, we might have to check with Foggy that I’m not legally declared dead, thus out of a lease, but I don’t see why we can’t move there temporarily.” Peter plucked at his sleeve. Wade laid a hand over his fidgeting. 

“From what I saw, he was a good kid. Loved science and helping people. If he was involved in whatever those evil guys were doing, it would have been because he didn’t know any better, not because he was a bad person.”

“I- I know. They let me see him, once. Before they woke him up. They were still…perfecting their formula. He- he was the first one to survive.” Peter pressed the heel of his palm between his eyes. “He was still so young. Barely bigger than Kaine, and they still sent him out there. He was mine! And they-“ 

Wade rested a scarred hand on his shoulder, and his voice broke.

“Petey Junior was a good kid, and I know that because nothing that comes from you could ever be bad.”

The hero laughed hollowly, leaning into the touch. “Remind me to tell you how the Lizard was made again.”

Wade rolled his eyes.  
…

“Foggy, I need your help adopting my kids.”

The lawyer paused for half a heart beat, then sighed deeply. His head tilted upwards, seeking divine intervention. “If this is punishment for ever once saying I was bored, I fully repent.” He turned back to his client. “Hello Misters Parker-Wilson.”

Through his office door came a smiling brunette, along side his ever masked partner. When Foggy began working at his new firm, they had wanted him to cut all of his old clients. That was, until they found out that, not only did one of his clients hold the rights to several superhero copyrights, but also was one of the ever growing members of the masked vigilante crowd, they changed their minds. Foggy fought tooth and nail to keep the couple out of his boss’s grip, citing every privacy law and loophole he could. Luckily, they were so desperate to acquire Foggy as an employee, that they allowed him to keep the pair to himself, instead of having all their cases open to the entire firm.

Sometimes, Foggy regretted not having anyone to talk to about their strange requests and cases (not enough to call up he-who-shall-not-be-friended-again though). Like now, for instance.

The lawyer sighed with all the weary weight of the world on his shoulders, as the couple expressed their desires. “Mr. Parker-Wilson, I cannot legally help you with an adoption without knowing where the children in question came from.” He indicated the screen of his computer. “They’re not in the system, not even a birth certificate, so there’s not much I can legally do.”

“Oh. Well, we…can’t really do that. Mr. Nelson.” Peter picked at his sleeve. Deadpool laid a hand over his partner’s to still the movement, brows drawn together behind his mask. 

“Give me five minutes,” the mercenary said, pulling out his cell and walking into the hall.

Foggy watched him go with trepidation. “Uh.”

The spidery hero fumbled with his fingers.

“So.” The blonde cast about. “Adopting. That’s a big step. I’m so happy for you two.”

Peter beamed. “Thanks! It was kinda sudden, but the boys are just adorable, and they’re ours.”

“Er, right.” Outside the wavy glass, a red masked figure could be seen pacing, arms gesticulating wildly as he talked into his phone. “Well, with your marriage license going through, that should make things a lot easier.”

“That’s great!”

At that moment, Wade opened the door, cheerfully poking his masked head back into the office. “All done~!” He traipsed back to his seat beside Peter, discreetly slipping a cell phone back into his pocket. “Check your records again Foggy Bear, our kids should be in there.”

Dubiously, the lawyer refreshed his browser, and sure enough two names which had previously not existed in the system, appeared on the screen. “I’m not going to get implicated in whatever this is, which is nothing, because that would mean that I knew something was going on, which it isn’t?”

The man’s grin shone even through his red mask. “Nothing to worry about. The author’s hand waving this plot point.”

The blonde’s brows drew together. “Uh, right.”  
…

“So, you’re officially Kaine Reilly, my nephew, and Ben Reilly is your brother. Then with the adoption, you can use our last names too, so you’re Kaine and Ben Parker-Wilson.”

“Or Wilson-Parker!” Wade chimed in.

The clone frowned at the doctored birth certificates. Brown eyes ticked back up to Wade and Peter. “But you’re both still my parents, right?”

“Oh, Rose Bud, of course we are!” Wade cooed, sweeping him into his arms.

Peter joined the embrace as well. “This is just for other people, and so you can go to school.”

“But isn’t that lying?” Came the muffled question.

The parents exchanged masked looks. 

“…well, sweetie, think of it like playing pretend. We know we’re your parents, and you know, but everyone else won’t understand.”

Kaine pulled himself from his parent’s grip with a gasp. “Is that like how you both wear costumes sometimes?”

Peter winced, but Wade broke in before he could reply.

“Yes, exactly. This is your mask to hide your secret identity, like how your daddy and I wear masks when we fight crime.”

“And this means I can go to school?”

“Yes.” Peter said. “Your mother and I looked at some nice public schools nearby the apartment. You’re starting in September, but we’ll take some time to look at all of them over the summer, and find the one you like best, ok?”

The clone whooped, pumping his fists into the air. He leapt into his progenitor’s arms. Peter’s super strength was the only thing keeping him from getting knocked down. 

“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!” the teen chanted, squeezing for all he was worth.

“You’re welcome!” the hero gasped, feeling his ribs creek. 

Wade cut in before medical intervention became necessary. “Come on Rose Bud. We gotta go buy your notebooks and school things.”

Kaine flung himself on his other parent. “Can I have a mall makeover, like in the movies? Like, where we buy bags and bags of things, and I get a far out haircut, and lots of new clothes to wear, and sunglasses?”

“That’s the last time you watch Clueless, but sure, why not?”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Kaine is the most special snowflake. He’s also more Tom Holland-ish than Peter.


	11. Three Generations of crazy

…

Peter jerked awake. He clawed futilely at the covers, before blinking away the nightmare of too white walls and antiseptic, to see the familiar clutter of his and Wade’s bedroom. He sat up, wondering what had woken him, when he heard another soft fumble of metal scraping against the front door lock.

Terror seized the hero’s throat, and he immediately made for Benny’s makeshift trundle cradle in the dresser, before seeing that the baby was already beside him, snoozing gently in the still warm indentation left by his other parent. Casting about, Peter saw Deadpool standing beside the bedroom door, face a blank mask. The light from the streetlamp through the window reflected dully off the barrel of his Desert Eagle.

The couple’s eyes met, and Peter slowly gathered the baby in his arms, preparing to make a break out of the small window, just like the tiny family had practiced.

The front door lock clicked, and a three stepped collection of sounds shuffled into the house. There was a clatter of a body running into furniture, and knocking it over. At the melodious sound of copious swearing, Deadpool’s posture relaxed. His tense frown was replaced with a broad grin, and he clicked the safety back on his handgun.

“Al!” he crowed, flinging open the bedroom door. “My favorite batty old blind biddy! How are you?” 

“Wade, when the hell did you move the couch? I nearly broke my hip!” the woman growled, knocking at the fallen ikea dresser with her cane.

The merc’s voice was mockingly contrite as he replied. “Oh, well, you see, we had to make some renovations to make space for my family. Rose Bud, come over here and say hello.”

Kaine dropped from where he had been stuck to the ceiling, landing in a perfect crouch beside his parent. “Mom, who’s this?”

Al scowled in the general direction of the teen’s voice. “I’m gone for a few weeks, and you pick up a munchkin. If you kidnaped it, I’m not giving you an alibi.”

Wade put his hands on his son’s shoulders proudly. “Al, this is Kaine, my son. Kaine, this is Blind Old Gramma Al.”

“Oh!” Kaine looked back at his parent’s smiling face. 

His smirk, if anything, got bigger. “Now, just like we practiced!”

Kaine’s grin matched his mother’s, and he flung his arms around Al’s shoulders. “Granny!”

The old woman’s brows drew together, and her lips twisted. 

Peter chose that moment to creep out of the bedroom, a grumbling Benny in his arms. “Don’t worry, Al. We’re just here for a few more days before we go to our new apartment.”

“Peter.” Al turned to him, one eyebrow raised. “I see the idiot here managed to convince you to come back to him. You know you shouldn’t settle, just because the guy knocked you up.”

Wade’s expression went blank, even as the spidery hero chuckled. He stepped over to give the old woman a one armed hug. Benny grumbled from his position over his father’s shoulder. “It’s good to see you too Al.”

“And there’s another one?” she said, gentle hands roaming over the baby’s back. “There better not be a third stashed under the coffee table.”

“Nope, just these two.”

Al hummed, tweaking Benny’s nose. He sneezed, and grumbled some more. “Sounds like the little human wants to go back to bed.”

Peter yawned. “Yeah.” He crossed back to the bedroom door, making a pit stop to kiss his partner’s cheek. “See you soon.”  
…

Later, when the baby, teenager, and old woman were tucked safely back in dreamland, Peter was woken by the creak of the floorboards beside his bed.

He cracked his eyes open, to see a familiar burley figure. “Wade? Why are you up? come back to bed…”

A slight weight on the mattress as the mercenary leant back down. “I was just gonna go on the couch. Go back to sleep.”

“What?” Peter struggled up to an elbow. “You all right?”

“I’m fine,” came the hushed reply. “I just don’t want to bother you.”

The spidery hero pulled his partner back down with his free arm, wrapping around his like a limpet. “Not bothering me. Why’d you think that?”

Careful hands slid around his back. “I get that you’re only staying with me because of the kids, and-“

“What?”

“Before. You told me not to come back if I took the job, and I did. I’m sorry. I can still leave if you want, but I’ll totally be around to babysit, and-“

Slow realization dawned in Peter’s eyes. “Oh, Wade, that was a stupid argument. I didn’t mean that I actually wanted you gone. I was just angry.” He slumped against the merc’s shoulder. “Please forgive me?”

“For what? Being the man I fell in love with?”

The hero chuckled. “What romance novel did you dig that out of?”

“One smothered in cheese and taco sauce.”

The laughter was louder this time, very nearly not muffled in time when Peter pressed a kiss to his partner’s collar bone. Wade wrapped his arms more securely around the other, nuzzling into his hair.

“I’m sorry for making you sad.”

Peter sighed tiredly. “And I’m sorry for trying to change you.” A nearly imperceptible shudder ran up his spine. “There are…bad people in the world. I can’t believe that one person should be jury and executioner, not matter how easy that would make things. But, I realize that if you believed that too, I wouldn’t be here.” He kissed the mercenary’s chin. “The dichotomy of life, I suppose.”

“I have no idea what that means, but I love you anyway.”

Another shared kiss. “Ditto.”  
…

“So, the lease on my old apartment is still up until January, but if we sublet the place out, we can move into the new apartment that has the extra bedroom for the boys before summer.”

“Sounds good, boo.” Wade said, sorting through boxes of ammunition. “Do you think I should bring all the AK ammo, or just enough to get by?”

Peter eyed the overflowing boxes with trepidation. “…It might be best if you left all the artillery at your house here. Benny is still so little, I don’t want the boys getting into any of your things and getting hurt.”

“Not even Big Boi?” Wade cried, brandishing the Desert Eagle. 

The hero fiddled with his sleeve. “Just enough for emergencies. Nothing you would take on a long job.”

“I’ll buy a padlock and a gun safe.”

Peter raided an eyebrow, and casually bent a stray bit of rebar on the table with his fingers. 

“A big lock,” Wade amended.  
…

“Its SO HUGE!” Kaine crowed, racing up the walls of their new home.

“You can thank the Mexican cartel for paying well,” Wade said, as he lugged in a suitcase stuffed with knickknacks. “And don’t leave footprints on the ceiling, you know your father doesn’t like that.”

“Thanks Mexican cartel!” the clone crowed, and flipped from his place by the skylight to the floor. “Can I pick out my room?”

“The one with the window is ours. Yours is by the bathroom.” Peter said, climbing the stairs with Benny in his arms and a diaper bag over his shoulder. 

Kaine ran down the hall, skidding across the wood floor. “It actually has a BATH!” He shouted.

“No messing with the faucets until we show you how they work!” Peter called. A muffled shout was his only answer. He sighed, and moved to kiss Wade on the cheek.

The merc leaned down obligingly, and nuzzled his partner. “Why am I carrying the heavy things? You’re the one with super strength.”

“I think you said something about subverting gender roles, and flexed your muscles, before leaving me with the baby. I was so overcome, I couldn’t get a word in edgewise.”

“Oh right.” Deadpool said airily, letting his burdens crash to the floor. “Ok Mr. Daddy, I’ve asserted my independence and shown who wears the frilly maid outfit in this family; it’s mommy’s turn to mind Benny. You can go bring up the rest of the stuff from the van.”

Chuckling, Peter handed over the grumbling child, who immediately latched onto the edges of Deadpool’s mask with his inhumanly strong little fingers, and headed back down the stairs.

“Daw, look it! He wants to be a masked vigilante, just like us!” Wade tickled the baby’s tiny palms. “Don’t you! You can be Spider-Pool! Which sounds just close enough to your daddy’s and mine’s pairing name to be puny!”

The baby cooed, and shifted his grip from the mask to the tantalizingly gloved hands. There was a clean crack. 

“Ouchie!” Deadpool said, trying to tug his broken fingers out of the giggling child’s grip. “No Benny, don’t laugh at mommy’s pain. This wasn’t nearly comical enough. No explosions!”

Peter returned at that moment, holding a stack of boxes. “What’s all the commotion?”

Deadpool turned to his partner, bent fingers on full display in the baby’s grip. “Spidey, tell your son that if he insists on laughing when maiming others, he needs to develop a more fully formed sense of style and pinash to make it worth a full out evil chuckle.”

The hero blinked. “Uh, what?”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> super powered babies, always fun.


	12. Little Spider Adventures

…

The couple was spending a rare dinner date together. Wade had surprised Peter after work, with the assurance that the boys were safe at home watching TV, and had whisked the spidery hero away for a rooftop date of tacos and crime fighting.

After swinging through the city and stoping two muggings and a purse snatcher, they decided to try out a new Mexican takeout place they hadn’t been to yet. 

Wade squinted at the menu, black gloves tapping on his masked chin in theatrical ponderousness. Beside him, clad also in red, Spiderman ordered three bean burritos from the bemused looking cashier.

Eventually the mercenary settled for three chimichangas, and together they retired to a wobbly dented table in the back corner of the restaurant.

“Anyway, we tots have to go see that new superhero movie that came out. I hear they’re giving the lead a boyfriend! Or was it a mano-a-mano fight with a convoluted plot no one cared about…. I forget which one the author’s parodying.”

Peter set down his food, hands drawing back into his lap. “Ah, I don’t really like to go to the theaters any more. That’s where they, uh-“ He looked down at his hands.

Wade nearly swallowed his tongue. “Forget it! Forget I said ANYTHING! So, how about then Broncos?”

“No, you should know.” Spiderman rallied, taking a deep breath, and putting his hands back on the table, where he shredded the foil wrappings of his food into smaller metal pieces. “So, remember when I joked that they had never caught me yet, and you said they had never tried military grade weaponry? Well… apparently someone else got the memo too. I was patrolling, and usually I can sense and dodge anything, but they used some kind of area affecting sonic device. Never found out what it was, but I couldn’t dodge it. I crawled into the back entrance of a movie theater, and I think I passed out. I can’t stand the smell of popcorn anymore either.” He plucked at his sleeve. “That was about a week after you left.”

“Babe-“

The hero grinned, the placating gesture visible even through his mask. “It’s all right. I- I should talk about these things. With you. Because I don’t want us to fight any more.”

Wade reached out, stilling Peter’s fidgeting hands, covering them completely with his own black gloves. “I swear I’ll never make you sad again.”

Peter flipped his palms, entwining their fingers.

The bell over the door rang, and a harried looking blonde woman in stylish shoes bustled into the restaurant.

“Trish!” Wade squealed, immediately perking up. The woman flinched, looking around for the voice. “Spidey!” The merc shook his lover’s hands spastically with his own. “Spidey! This is my sidekick! The one who helped me find you!!”

The woman blinked hard at the red duo, mouth gone slack as she took in the incongruity of two masked vigilantes eating Mexican.

“Deadpool!” Her grin didn’t look entirely forced, which immediately put her several notches higher in Peter’s books. She approached the table cautiously, stoping just out of reach. “And… Spiderman?”

Peter detached himself from his partner, and gave a little wave of acknowledgement.

The woman, Trish, looked back at Wade, who had rolled down his mask to cover his chin once more. “Deadpool, you never said your husband was Spiderman!”

The merc chuckled. “Oh, didn’t I? Whoops.”

Peter swallowed, and pulled down his mask as well. “Don’t mind him, he’s an idiot. Thanks for helping to save me. Is there anything we can do to repay you?”

Trish’s speechlessness evaporated as a wide, bordering on manic, smile broke over her face. “Let me interview you!”

Peter chuckled. “Uh, well, I dunno if anyone would want to hear me… I’m not really the best public speaker…”

“You’re Spiderman! Everyone in New York knows about you!”

“I always thought I was kinda an urban myth type of thing.”

“Well, then this is the perfect time to put those rumors to rest! The only way the public knows about you is through that awful anti-powers newspaper. This could be your opportunity to tell people your side of the story, and show them that not all super humans are bad!”

Peter picked at his sleeve. “I dunno, I’m not actually that interesting.”

“Let me be the judge of that!”

Wade cackled. “Aw, my Spidey, the radio star! Can I get an autograph?”

The hero rolled his eyes.

Trish pressed on. “Here’s my card. Call me if you ever change your mind, ok?”

Sighing, he agreed, tucking the paper into his sleeve.  
…

Peter was at work, having explained his long absence as being a family emergency. His position teetered on the edge of being fired, then the spectrometer broke again, and the lab was more than happy to have their appliance whisperer back.

Kaine didn’t understand why his father was leaving, at first. That led to a long discussion of employment, then why money was important to live comfortably, then an amendment by Peter about how said money needed to be procured ethically (and stop telling him it’s easiest just to rob a bank Wade, it’s not funny!).

The spidery hero spent an extra moment to give the teen a hug, and kiss the baby, before stuffing a pancake in his mouth and darting out the door.

That left the teenager on the couch beside his other parent, pouting at the TV screen, which was full of gunfire and zombies as Deadpool played.

“I’m bored,” he groused.

“The other controller’s right there. I can teach you double player.”

“But Mom! These are boring! Come explore the city with me!”

Wade huffed as his avatar was eaten by zombie hoards. On his left side, Benny chewed on a teething ring, eyes fixed on the screen. “You know, once you actually start school, you’ll really wish that you spent the summer lazing around playing video games on the couch with me.”

Kaine crossed his arms petulantly. “Come on, please can we go out? I wanna do something!” 

“Not every day can be a big adventure, Rose Bud.” Wade said sagely. “Sometimes, you have to make do with the little adventures you make for yourself, while chugging through the monotonous trials needed to keep the day spinning.”

He indicated the blinking screen with his video game controller. “This is is one of those monotonous trials, because sometimes I need to kill something real bad, and this is a less violent way to do that. Also, if I quit now, Hawk_guy77 will win, and I’ll never live it down.”

“But I want to go out!”

The merc considered this, and reached into his belt. “All right.” He handed the teen one of his burner phones. “Do you remember how to use this?”

Kaine nodded. “Nine one one for emergencies, but I call you and dad first.”

“Close enough.” The merc accessed the google map function. “Now, I’m gonna save the apartment address in here, so you can make your way back. Do you remember where the subway is?”

“On the corner, and I ride the red line to get to and from the city back here. I know!” The teen practically bounced in his seat. “Can I go now?”

“Hold your horses!” He zoomed out on the map. “Now, you can go walking around this part of the city.” Wade traced his finger over the main tourist trap laden streets of New York. “But you don’t go anywhere else without your dad and me, ok? And no talking to strangers. And if someone tries to mug you, what do we do?”

“Knee caps.”

Wade ruffled his hair. “Good boy!”   
…

Kaine stuffed his hands into the pockets of his oversized red hoodie. Summer was burning fast through the city, but the clone always felt most comfortable with the ability to hide his face. Deadpool never left the house without some kind of covering, and the habit had rubbed off on his son.

He squinted at street signs, his reflexes allowing him to easily dodge other pedestrians before they hit him. Not that there were many where he was… The clone hunched his shoulders, and turned down a dirty street. If he found a subway entrance, he should be able to find his way to a landmark. 

Though exploring new areas of the city was stimulating, Kaine was not sure how his parents would feel to his breaking their rules. Though, using the adult caretakers of teenagers on television as an example, it wouldn’t be good.

He rounded a corner, and heard a sharp shout coming out of an alleyway. Curious, the teen jogged a few steps closer, and looked in to see a girl, about his own age, being accosted by a man in a dress shirt.

“Hey, back off!” the blonde barked again, pulling her purse closer to her side.

“No need to be so hostile, baby.” The man leered, encroaching on her personal space again.

“Hey, you leave her alone!” Kaine yelled, shoulders squaring as he tried to puff himself up at the end of the alleyway. 

The man looked over his shoulder, and the girl took the momentary distraction to dodge around his arms.

The man snarled, and snatched at her, but Kaine sprinted into the alleyway, and shoved his shoulder against a dumpster, to provide a barrier between himself and the girl to cut off his grab. His shove was miscalculated, and the heavy metal rectangle flew too fast across the alley, crashing with enough force to crumple the metal against the opposite brick wall.

“Oops!” Kaine side eyed the thief and victim.

“Freak!” the man yelled, eyes wild, before running full kilter out of the opposite end of the alley. 

The teen frowned, watching him run. “Well, that’s wasn’t very nice- Oof!”

“You’re my hero!” the girl gasped, flinging her arms around his neck. 

Kaine felt his face heat up, and intestines flutter. Cataloguing the sensation, the teen found that he liked it. All too soon for his liking, the girl let him go, and ran off down the sidewalk.

“Golly,” he breathed, phantom press of her body still tingling across his skin. “I think I like being a hero.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Spectrometers suuuuuuuuuck. So do bioanalyzers, because every time someone leaves the reagents out and they go bad, you have to do a whole systems check (which takes FOREVER) before determining, yes, that ass last week stored the reagents improperly, costing us like a week of work and a week to wait for new reagents to be ordered, fml. And fu unable to be stored at room temp reagents, FU to the autoclave, where all the uses pipettes go to be melted down and incinerated.


	13. Busted

“And in other news, eye witness reports saw a strange figure swinging into a burning building down town. Could this be the return of New York’s infamous urban vigilante Spiderman?”

Peter blinked at the reporter on the screen, as she showed a clip, obviously taken from a camera phone, of a red blur swinging clumsily into a smoking window, amid sirens and screams.

“Hey babe?” He called across the apartment. Wade looked up from the kitchen table, where he was polishing his swords. “Did you borrow my web slingers again?”

The merc furrowed his brows. “I don’t think so. Why?”

Peter rewound the report and adjusted his laptop for his partner to see, increasing the volume as he went. 

Deadpool blinked. “Huh.” Brown eyes met hazel, and the parents shared a steel cable of understanding. “So, should I go shout for him, or should you?”

“No shouting, Benny’s taking his nap.” Peter heaved a sigh. “Just give me a second to psyche myself up, otherwise I might end up accidentally killing our progeny.” The hero took a moment to press the heels of his palms against his eyes, before he got up off the couch. “Ok, let’s go.”

Together the couple went down the hall and knocked on their son’s door. “Kaine, open up. we need to have a talk.”

“Coming!” There was a moment of shuffling, then the door opened, revealing the innocently blinking clone. “What’s up?”

“One of my costumes is missing.” Peter said. “Have you seen it?”

“No.” The teen said too quickly.

“Uh hu. Then, can I look around your room for a minute?”

“Um-“

But the spidery hero already shouldered his way inside. He lifted up the mattress with one arm, and pulled out a crumpled red and blue costume with the other. Deadpool stood in the doorway, arms crossed.

“Kaine! Why did you steal one of my costumes?” Peter said, brandishing the ball of fabric.

“I just wanted to do what you and mommy do!” The teen blurted, fingers fiddling together frantically.

Peter let out a sigh of frustration to hold back the creeping tide of parental terror. “Kaine, sweetie, you can’t go swinging around in one of my costumes. You don’t know how to fight off bad guys. What if you had gotten hurt?”

“I help people fine.” The clone said petulantly. “And I would know if you taught me.”

“Can’t argue with that logic,” Deadpool said, nodding.

Peter rounded on him. “Wade, no! We are not raising our boys to be super heroes!”

The merc glanced at him amusedly from the corner of his eye. “If our boys are anything like you, we won’t be able to stop them from going out by themselves. So might as well make sure they know what they’re doing.”

Kaine rounded with his new ally. “Yeah! You and mommy are always too busy to be there all the time, because you’re taking care of me and Benny and are at work and stuff! I have free time, so I should be out there helping people when you can’t, because it’s the right thing to do!”

Peter pressed his palms against his face. “Oh my god, he’s just like me. Aunt May always said she hoped I would have kids just like me, because of the grey hairs I put her through. She’s laughing at me from her grave, I just know it.”

Wade patted his shoulder comfortingly. 

“So, I can keep going out?”

“No!” Peter practically screamed.

Kaine jutted out his lower lip in an exaggerated pout, arms crossed over his chest. “But why?”

“Come on boo.” Deadpool placated. “If we tell him no, we’ll just be looking over our shoulder to see if he’s sneaking out. He’s watched too much TV not to try.”

The teen beamed at his parent.

Peter sighed, hands running through his brown hair. “Ok, fine. But it’s only for a trial period only! And you’re not allowed to face any kind of super villain, or world ending crisis! In fact, if I hear you doing more than saving cats from trees, you’re grounded!”

“Yes sir!” The clone saluted, grin betraying his delight.

“I just know I’m going to regret this,” Peter muttered.  
…

Kaine swung closer to the tall building, giddy to discover how far he could see across the city if he climbed to perch on its top. He might be able to even see New Jersey, or- or maybe even Philadelphia! Surely such a tall tower would let him see that far…

With a flip of his wrist, the teen launched himself towards the shining steel construct, landing on the glass of what he estimated to be the eightieth floor. His fingers stuck fast to the smooth pane, and he grinned as he climbed, composing in his mind how he would describe this day’s fun to Benny.

Kaine remembered being that small, and the difficulty he had managing the formulation of words with his baby tongue. Idly, the clone wondered how long it would take for his little brother to start talking. His parents said at least a year, but Kaine could barely conceptualize a time span of six months, and a year seemed so unthinkably far away… 

He levered himself over the edge of the building with an internal cheer. Flipping his body over the railing to lay back against the painted landing pad, the teen gazed into the smog hazed sky. His arms burned pleasantly with exertion, but his breathing was already evening out. In his mind, he saw his cells working the lactic acid out of his system, just like in the diagrams of his father’s thick books.

Suddenly, the teen’s sharp hearing picked up thundering footsteps, and he arched his back to spin flip himself to his feet.

The door on the opposite side of the landing pad burst open, disgorging a blaring alarm, as well as a muscled blonde man wearing a too tight white shirt and jeans.

Kaine took half a second too long framing the man with his eyes, so didn’t have the chance to leap off the roof before the man spoke.

“Who are you?” The man rumbled, like a revving sports car.

The clone felt his face heat, and tried to catalogue where he had seen this man before in the context of where he was, and why he was suddenly so flustered. It didn’t feel exactly like fear, more like what he had felt the first time he had saved that girl… Oh. That’s where he had seen him before.

Captain America scowled, and spoke again. “Who are you?”

Kaine tilted his head to the side, trying to emulate his father, despite the hunch the hero’s expression automatically put on his shoulders. “Uh, I thought people knew this costume by now. I’m Spiderman.”

“Spiderman is dead.” The national icon growled.

The wall crawler picked at the kevlar cuffs of his sleeve. “That was my brother.”

Captain America’s shock was palpable, deflating his mountainous figure to a sorrowful square. He paused, collecting his thoughts. “He never said that he had family.”

“Well, what did he say?” The picking increased in frequency. Did that clone know that he was a clone? Did he know about his siblings? About their father? Or was he just another pawn thrown off the chessboard?

Kaine didn’t want to know the answer to those questions, as they made something in his gut twist with terrifying ‘might have beens’. However, he also knew his parents would want to know, especially Peter, who still had that haunted look in his eye whenever the death of Spiderman was brought up.

The blonde’s scowl deepened. He raised a hand half way to his ear, as if to knock away a fly. His eyes unfocused on the horizon, as if he were listening to a voice. Kaine could make out faint electrical buzzing, like the static of a radio, coming from the tiny com in the hero’s ear. 

The national icon’s eyes refocused on the teen. “Why don’t you come inside, meet the rest of the Avengers. They could tell you more about…your brother than I could.”

Kaine took a step closer to the ledge. His parent’s warnings about strangers tangling with the knowledge of Captain America’s sterling reputation, resulting in a confused question as to whether he counted as a stranger or not. 

“No, wait!” The captain reached out for him.

Spooked, Kaine turned and jumped off the side of the building. His arms shot out immediately, shooting off a succession of web lines to slow his descent. Soon he was level with the other buildings of the skyline, and swinging his way home.  
…

Landing on the fire escape, the teen opened the window as quietly as he could.

“Kaine?” The congested voice rang from the couch.

Quickly, he strode over, to see Peter laying in a nest of blankets, looking miserable. “Dad, are you ok?”

The hero waved his son’s concern away. “I had to go through a derelict building last night checking out a drug ring. Fell through some rotted floor boards into a bunch of black mold infested plaster. Must have breathed in more than I thought before I could change my suit.” Peter grouched. “Your mother’s at work, and Benny’s taking a nap.”

Kaine fiddled with his sleeve, standing close to his parent in fascinated worry. “Is there anything I can do? I saw a thing on TV once about chicken soup… Am I gonna get sick too?” He sounded too excited at the prospect.

His parent sniffed. “It’s just allergies my body needs to work out of its system. You’ll be fine. You get your hardy constitution from me, so you’ll probably never have to worry about ever actually being sick.”

“Oh.” The teen deflated.

Peter chuckled. “Trust me, you’re not missing much.” The older spider sneezed, a wad of webbing spluttering out of his mouth. “E~ew.” He moaned, grimacing at the mess on his hands.

Kaine proffered a roll of paper towels, which his progenitor gratefully took. “Do you want some orange juice or anything else?”

“That sounds awesome.”

The teen soon returned from the kitchen, handing over a cup. “So…” he said, casually. “I met the Avenger’s today. They thought I was Spiderman.”

The glass in Peter’s hand shattered. “What!?”

“I think it was the costume,” Kaine continued, speculatively picking at the hem of his sleeve.

“That’s it, you’re not allowed to wear my costume anymore!”

“What! Why?”

“You’re getting your own costume, and you’re not allowed to go out anymore without me or Deadpool!” He turned to clean up the glass shards, muttering to himself. “I can’t believe we let this go on for as long as we did! What if one of my villains thought he was me? Oh god, what if IGH did?”

“Dad?” The clone ventured. Peter shook his head sharply.

“Go check on your brother.”

“But-“

“Now Kaine! I have to call your mother.”  
…

Sitting on the floor of his room, baby brother tucked under his chin, Kaine listened to his parent’s less than hushed conversation. He could feel the frantic fevered footsteps of his father across the apartment’s wood floor reverberate through to where his back leant against his closed bedroom door.

Benny fussed in his arms, but the elder spider kissed his forehead in a motion their mother often performed, and he quieted.

“I will not let him anywhere near the Avengers Wade!” his father hissed. 

“Peter, you can’t keep him away from all the vigilantes in the city. It’s New York. We have more supers per capita than pretty much everywhere else in the world.” His mother tried to placate. “The Avengers aren’t the worst people he could have run in to-“

“Yes they are!” A stomp. “They’re the ones who killed-“ The voice cut out with a harsh intake of breath.

“Peter-“

“I looked up what happened, what they said happened. They held a fucking /press conference/to show he world they were all hunky-dory and everything was fine. They set him fighting some other hero during one of their damn internal disputes- which he should not have been involved in! They said he was more injured than initially suspected and was left behind to tend to himself, and do you know what I get from reading in between the lines of that?”

“Peter, you’re shouting.”

The volume descended back into a hiss, like escaping gas inches away from a flame. “I get that they left my son, our son, behind when he wasn’t useful to them anymore! They just left him in an airport lot when he was injured! He was a child! Those scientists didn’t teach him about limits, because he was expendable to them! And the Avengers just left him when he was too hurt to move!”

A silence, interspersed with quiet gasping breaths. Kaine could imagine his mother enveloping his father in an embrace, cradling the spidery hero close to his heart.

“I won’t let them have the chance to do that again.” Came his progenitor’s muffled voice.

“I know.”

“I can’t lose anyone else.”

“I know.” Faint sounds of shifting fabric. “We’re not going to lose them. Even if I have to kill the Marvel universe to get them back, we won’t lose them.”

Another silence, though the breathing was less fevered this time. “I won’t be able to stop him, will I. I can’t protect him from this.”

“Of course you can!” His mother’s cheery baritone filed the space with warmth. “You protect him by making sure he knows what to do, by not making him go through scary choices alone. You make sure he knows where he can go for help, and he knows he can ask for it when he needs it.” Then, quieter, “It’s all anyone can do.”  
…

“Dress up!” Wade squealed, hands pressed together with glee. “Now, since you’ve got powers like your daddy, you’ll want special foot guards with the thin fabric, instead of boots like mine.”

“Ok.” Kaine said easily.

“And look! I’ve been working on your web design too!” Wade brandished a sheaf of papers that looked torn from the backs of receipts.

The clone blinked, bemused at the crayon sketches. “Mom, I wanna make my own costume.”

Deadpool threw his arms around his son’s neck. “Aw, Rose Bud, I’m all for you being independent, but you also need to be safe. Your daddy ran around in just spandex when he was your age, and he nearly died more times than I’m comfortable with.”

The teenager groaned into the embrace, pressing his forehead against red leather. “But Mo~m. It’s embarrassing if you make my costume for me!”

“Kaine Arthur Parker-Wilson, the day you’re too old to have your mother dress you is the day I’ll stop cutting the crusts off your PBnJ sammiches.”

He gasped, pulling back. “You wouldn’t dare!”

Deadpool’s voice turned dark. “Try me.”

Kaine’s lips wobbled, but he nodded decisively. “Fine!”

“You would subject yourself to crusts?”

“I can cut them off myself!” The teenager crossed his arms over his chest petulantly.

The mercenary gasped, throwing his arms over his eyes dramatically. “My little pumpkin’s all growed up!” He looked back at his son. “Fine, you can make your own costume /design/ but I’m having it remade with kevlar. Capiche?”

“Deal!” Kaine said, sticking out his hand solemnly. 

“Look at you, manipulating the emotions of others to get your way. I’m so proud!” Deadpool shook the proffered hand. 

“I learned from the best.” The teen grinned, turning the shake into a fist bump.

“Just don’t tell your father.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Thus we have the birth of the Scarlet Spider. I think it might be a running joke that everyone in the Parker-Wilson household has a crush on Captain America.


	14. X-Spiders

…

Oscorp, being a multinational corporation, often played host to speakers, and these scientific conferences were made open to the public by invitation. Peter, being an employee, could forgo the exorbitantly expensive tickets and sneak himself and his plus one to the shrimp table without arousing any suspicion.

Wade was clad in a crisp suit with black gloves, face obscured by a beanie, dust mask, and thick rimmed pair of sun glasses. Peter was just glad he managed to convince him to leave the Deadpool face at home.

“While I find your nerd conventions just as interesting as you would expect me to,” Wade leaned close to his partner. “I hope you know that my motivations for coming with you are rather one track.”

Peter hummed, and kissed his partner’s cheek. “Hm~ well, you know I like to keep you frustrated.”

The merc growled. “You have no idea.” His arms made to wrap around he hero’s waist-

“Misters Parker and Wilson, what a pleasant surprise!” 

The growl turned feral, and Wade’s wandering hands were forced to stop their exploration, and clenched into fists. “Foiled again!”

A bald man in a wheelchair rolled his way towards the couple. By his half cocked smile, he seemed to know exactly what he had interrupted. “Mr. Wilson, your thoughts are as inscrutable as always.”

“Another friend of yours Wade?” Peter said, detaching himself from the mercenary’s embrace, straightening his shirt.

“No.” Came the merc’s annoyed reply. “Though I’m tempted just now to make him another target.”

Peter rolled his eyes, lightly elbowing his partner in the gut.

The bald man’s smile didn’t move, but his aura of smug intensified. “I’m Professor Charles Xavier. I believe you have met several associates of mine? Angel spoke highly of you.”

Spiderman’s smile became plastic, and Wade pressed closer to his side. 

“It’s impolite to go digging into people’s heads, baldy, especially to find top secret documents.” the merc hissed.

Peter’s power of speech seemed to come back online, and he elbowed his partner again. “Be polite!” He looked down at the professor, eyes guarded. “I take it you’re the rumored leader of our angelic friend’s organization?”

The professor smiled benignly. “No need for subterfuge Mr. Parker, I assure you no one else can hear us.” He held out a hand, which Peter shook automatically. “I was invited to attend this conference here at Oscorp, and thought it prudent to kill two birds with one stone, as they say.”

“Oh?”

“I was wondering if you and your husband might wish to enroll your children at my school for gifted youngsters,” the bald man said, smiling pleasantly.

“Nu uh. No way!” Wade growled. “That mansion explodes every other week! No kid of mine is going there! Besides, he would look awful in yellow! Our boy’s red all the way!”

Another elbow, accompanied by a glower from Peter, before he turned back. “We didn’t know your organization was aware that our son was planning to go to school.”

“I apologize, I am in the habit of investigating new mutants, in case they are in need of help. Your children recently appeared on my radar.” The Professor smiled benignly. “Here’s an information pamphlet, should you reconsider my offer.” He handed over a manilla envelope, and, with another parting smile, rolled away.

“Well, he seemed nice.” Peter said, opening the packet, and pulling out a stack of papers. “Oh and look, they even left contact information this time.”  
…

Much to Wade’s consternation, he was still reading long after the couple had returned home. “Looks like he wants to give Kaine a significant scholarship,” Peter said, scanning the letter. His eyes ticked up to meet his partner’s. “It couldn’t hurt to go and look?”

Deadpool blew a raspberry. “I’ve seen their CGI green screen, and it’s not as nice as advertised. They could barely afford two Xmen for my scenes. I bet if we go, the whole place will be mysteriously empty, and Steward an/or McAvoy won’t even be there.”

{Do we know which one’s cannon for us?}

[Dunno. Xmen are technically still owned by…Fox? Or was it Sony…]

{No, Sony had Spidey, then they let our eight legged wonder join the Avengers.}

[One wonders how these deals get made…]

{Probably the same way ours was: sheer fan fervor.}

Wade’s head twitched to the side, and he rubbed at his ear. “The point is,” he said loudly to Peter, “that Rose Bud will not be joining the X-dweebs!”  
…

“How the hell did we get here?”

{Scene change.}

[Didn’t you see the dot dot dot?]

Deadpool scowled at the doors of the mansion, arms crossed over his chest. Behind his shoulder, Benny bounced in his baby carrier, tiny fists clenched around Mr. Unicorn. The poor toy looked in need of having his limbs sewed back on again, under the near constant onslaught of super powered toddler.

Peter rolled his eyes at his partner, one arm over Kaine’s shoulder. The teen’s head flicked around the courtyard, like a cat after a laser pointer, trying to take in everything at once.

Scattered around the drive, on the great sweeping stretches of lawn, students milled about. A few shouted while tossing around a ball, while others ran after frisbees. Others still sat contentedly in the shade of the trees closer to the mansion.

Peter squinted at one such figure which caught his eye. “Sheila!” He squawked in surprise.

The figure spun with a whirl of pink tentacles, eyes searching for her caller. Her eyes fell on the small approaching group. Her brows furrowed. “Hi? Have we met?”

Peter chuckled. “Uh, yeah, but last time I saw you was under the streets of New York. I knew Callisto.”

The girl laughed embarrassedly. “Oh, gosh, I’m terrible with faces! I’m sorry that I don’t remember you.”

Peter smiled kindly. “It’s all right. How do you like it here? I was worried what happened to the Morlocks after you all vanished.”

The pink tentacles that made up her hair bunched happily. “Oh, the professor’s been great! After the sewers got exploded by those anti-mutant guys, a bunch of us stayed here! I haven’t been able to go to school since forever! It’s great!”

Peter smiled behind his mask. “That’s great Sheila.”

She nodded emphatically. “Callisto and some of the older people left a while ago, but I decided to stay with a few of the other kids. Being outside is just so nice! I don’t want to have to go back underground until I have to.”

“You shouldn’t have to.”

He laughed. “You sound just like the professor! Of course I will!” Her pink appendages waived. “Or have you not seen my accessories?”

“I like them!” Kaine piped up from where he partially had hidden himself behind Peter’s back.

The mutant blinked at him, askant. Her second set of clear eyelids flickering over her reflective pupils. The teenage boy flushed scarlet, the color deepening as he held her gaze.

Sheila smiled pointedly. “That’s the nicest thing a cute boy’s ever said to me!”

“Well, it’s been great seeing you.” Peter cut in, fearing that if any more blood rushed to his son’s face, he would pass out. “But we don’t want to be late for out meeting. We’ll see you later?”

“Sure thing!” She chirped, waving as the family continued up the drive.

The front doors were intimidatingly large, almost to the point of compensation, one *cough* Deadpool *cough* might say, until one *cough* Peter *cough* recalled that several residence of the house were well over seven feet tall.

A silver giant answered the door on the third knock.

“Deadpool, Mistar Parker. You have been expected.”

“Collusus, my man!” Deadpool crowed, handing off the baby to Peter, so he could annoy his way into the Russian’s personal space.

The mutant did a very good job of keeping his expression firmly long suffering, instead of slipping into the murderous annoyance the merc’s behavior usually inspired.

“The Professor is unfortunately out on business, so I am to be giving you a tour of the grounds, yes?”

“Hi Ho Silver!” Wade shouted, clambering halfway onto the other’s steel back. 

Peter rolled his eyes, and deftly tugged his husband back onto the stone entryway floor with his free arm. “That’s fine,” he said, to the relieved Collusus. “Thank you.”

The giant smiled stiffly, though that was more from his metallic exterior made hard by Russian sensibilities, than any genuine want of being intimidating. Kaine took a step closer to his father.

Collusus took them up the grand staircase, pointing out odd bits of trivia about the architecture and artwork as they went. Everything, though holding an air of wealth, still smelled of fresh paint in some places, and the masonry looked starkly fresh on some walls.

“And the dorms are over this way,” Colossus was saying placidly. “We have a wing for boys and girls, as you see. Both lead down to dining hall and kitchen, where children can be going for snacks.”

“Dorms?” Kaine piped, eyes wide. “Like in Harry Potter?”

The mutant’s smile was not entirely free of indulgence. “Exactly so.”

“You mean I would have to live here? Away from home?” Kaine’s fingers twisted in the hem of his sleeves, tearing the already frayed fabric.

“It makes it easier for students who are still learning their powers to have a stable environment where they can express themselves.”

“Oh.” The boy’s voice was subdued. “I, ah, yeah, that makes sense.”

The tour rounded the corner, bringing a short scruffy man in a wife beater with side burns. Wade practically imploded with glee.

“Wolvie!” Deadpool crooned, leaping to hang off the man’s neck like a gaudy red pendant. 

The mutant looked ready to remove the merc’s arms from his body, when he noticed the questioning gaze of Kaine at his father’s side. His murderous expression hesitated, long enough for Deadpool to drag him closer to the tiny family.

“Petey-pie, this is Wolverine! We used to work together back in the day, which was a Wednesday, doing all kinds of /redacted/ information for men in a five sided building!” Deadpool wriggled excitedly, arms still around the other’s neck. “Wolvie, this is my hunky-bun and our babies!”

The poor mutant looked even more out of his depth.

Peter took pity on him, and shifted his grip on Benny, so he could extend a hand. “Hi, I’m Peter.”

Wolverine shook off the mercenary, like a cat ridding itself of water, and straightened up. Carefully, he accepted the other’s hand. “Logan.”

“So, are you a teacher here?” The spidery hero smiled. In the background, Deadpool watched the two, hands clasped dramatically in front of his face.

“Gym,” the mutant grunted.

Peter hummed. “Can you tell us a bit about that?” His free hand fell onto Kaine’s shoulder, where the teen was still standing close, watching the hairy man with trepidation. “The professor seems to want our son to enroll here, but I’m curious how you’ll be able to accommodate his needs, beyond educational, that is.”

The mutant’s gaze flicked down to the teen, who spoke at a prompting nudge of his parent. “I’m really strong. And dad says that means I can’t do sports and stuff in a normal school.”

The harsh expression didn’t waiver. “Sports are just for fun here. Not a lot of schools like us we can compete with. I run the danger room obstacle course for kids who want to use their powers for defense.”

“Wow, really?”

A minuscule smile quirked Wolverine’s lips. “Yup.”

The ‘gym coach’ accompanied the tour, showing them the aforementioned danger room, before breaking away to continue on his own business (much to the vocalized displeasure of Deadpool). Afterwards the family spoke with a few more teachers before going home.  
…

Back in at the apartment Peter bounced Benny on his knee while Wade puttered about the kitchen in his frilly apron making celebratory tacos.

“It did seem like a pretty cool opportunity,” the hero was saying. “Heck, I wish I could have gone there as a kid.”

“The indoor pool was pretty cool,” the merc conceded, pirouetting to place two plates on the table in front of his husband and son. Another spin had him sitting at the kitchen table as well, a chimichanga already half way to his mouth. “Kitchen wasn’t too bad either.”

“Chew with your mouth closed, Wade. It sets a bad example for the children.” 

Benny cooed, twisted steel fork in his tiny fist. Kaine poked moodily at his food, elbows tucked close to his sides.

Peter pried the utensil from the baby’s fist. “Ah ah, Benny. No breaking things.”

“D’n w’ry I’ll j’s steal the X-m’ns st’ff n’xt t’m.” Deadpool gulped down a final bite, grinning with guacamole between his teeth. 

“Wade,” Peter chided. “It’s not polite to steal from people we want to teach our son.”

“Well-“

Two palms slammed on the table, splintering the wood. “I don’t want to go there!”

The parents’ attention immediately zeroed in on the teen.

Benny fussed in Peter’s arms. “Kaine?”

Tears pricked the boy’s eyes, and he shook his head to try and dispell the emotion. “I don’t want to go away! I don’t wanna leave!”

“Oh, Rose Bud-“ Deadpool pushed back his chair to crowd the shaking teen close with a hug. 

Kaine buried his face in his parent’s embrace, breath hitching. “I don’t wanna go there. Please don’t send me away!”

“Oh, baby,” Peter crooned, stroking through the distraught clone’s hair. “We’re not sending you anywhere! We just thought you might like being around other super-powered kids your own age.”

“Yeah!” Wade cut in, broad arms wrapped around his family. “No one’s gonna take you anywhere you don’t wanna go. And if anyone tries, you’ve got two of New York’s finest here to un-alive them for daring to try!”

…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:
> 
> “hunky-bun” was the one and only time my spell check auto-corrected to a word I approved of.
> 
> Also, Kaine is clearly at least bi, like Peter, and is completely confused by this thing known as hormones. It’s adorable. Shelia thinks so too.


	15. Iron Will

…

Kaine had religiously avoided the Avengers’s part of New York, after his confrontation with Captain America and his parent’s subsequent freak out. However, after some serious begging, and acquiring the life skill of ‘puppy dog eyes’, the teen had managed to convince his father to let him swing outside of Queens.

Which was how he found himself here, perched on one of the numerous apartment complexes in a less than idyllic part of the city, counting pigeons, and wondering exactly how much force he would have to exert if he wanted to hypothetically sling shot himself across the streets. Because…science…reasons……

His contemplations were interrupted by the rooftop access door opening. A scruffy man with close cropped blonde hair stepped out, hands tucked in his jeans pockets.

Kaine watched as the stranger sidled over to his corner of the roof, not sure whether he should swing away to grant the man some privacy. However, before the teen could make up his mind, the man spoke.

“So, Spiderman. If it wasn’t for the security footage, we wouldn’t have believed Cap when he said he saw you.”

“What?” The boy totally did not squeak.

The man chuckled, leaning his elbows on the edge of the roof where Kaine crouched. “You even hit puberty yet, kid?”

“I’m not-“ He cleared his throat, vocals deepening with effort. “I mean, I’m not Spiderman.”

The man quirked a brow. “Oh?”

“Oh, my parents made me get my own costume. I’m the Scarlet Spider now.” He spread his hands to show off the black claws, chest, and head drape over his otherwise entirely red costume.

The archer blanched. “There’s more of you?”

Kaine folded himself back into a crouch, picking at his sleeve. “Yes?”

“I should start up an inter-super team baseball event. At the rate this city is filling up, we could start a league. Tony could fund us- All Star Avengers!”

“You’re an Avenger!?”

“When I’m not being a landlord.”

Kaine tilted his head in confusion, the sentence having continued to stall his instinct to leap away.

“I own this place.” He clarified, sticking out a hand. “Hawkeye.”

“What?” The teen jerked off the side of the building, the barest tips of his fingers and toes holding him from the downward pull of gravity. “Oh Em GEE! Mommy loves you SO MUCH, you’re, like, the favorite Avenger in our house! Like that time you and mommy teamed up to kick butt! Oh, wait, mom said that was in a parallel time line, but, whatever, that’s still SO COOL!”

Bemused, the hero pressed a hand to his ear. “My hearing aids were turned down. Could you repeat that?”

Kaine’s fingers fluttered with an apology. ‘Sorry! You’re deaf?’

Hawkeye raised an eyebrow. ‘You sign?’

‘Mommy has bad days,’ Kaine replied. 

‘You’re good. Lots of your family impaired?’

The teen’s hands wavered in a soundless um, ’My granny’s blind. And Mommy sometimes can’t see well either when their eyes get sick, so I’m used to being’ another pause of thought, ‘accommodating.’

‘Your parents must be proud.’

The young hero beamed.

Hawkeye tapped his ear, wincing. ‘The battery on these are going. Left my back ups at the tower.’

Kaine twitched his fingers together in a folding motion. ‘That sucks.’

‘Yep.’ Hawkeye nodded to the tower, just visible in the distance. ‘Could you swing me up there?’

Kaine fiddled with his fingers. “Uh…”

‘We got pop tarts~’

“Well…” The fiddling continued. ‘I guess only for a minute.’

‘Thanks, swinging-little-spider’ and here Hawkeye swung his arm while his splayed fingers signed out ‘itsy-bitsy-spider’.

‘I resent that call sign, bird-man,’ Kaine signed, flapping his hands in revenge. The teen picked at his sleeve, before straightening from his crouch. ‘Just hop on my back and hold on tight.’

One heart pounding joy swing over the city later, where Hawkeye dried his darndest to scream the young hero into a similar state of deafness as himself, the duo landed atop Avenger’s Tower. 

A red haired woman was already waiting when they arrived. She and Hawkeye exchanged familiar glances, before her gaze fell on the fighting teen.

“Natasha!” The archer grinned like the cat who caught the canary. “This is the kid Cap’s been talking about. Calls himself Scarlet Spider now, apparently.”

“Really?” Her gaze hadn’t moved, and Kaine was beginning to believe that many must have scurried away so as to not to be under this woman’s scrutiny. He himself was quite tempted to do likewise. 

“I should really go,” the teen tried to say, making his way towards the ledge of the sky scraper, but Natasha had thrown a companionable arm over his shoulder, trapping him by her side. 

“Without staying to chat? How rude.” She began to steer him towards the rooftop access door, where Hawkeye was already waiting.

“Uh, is it? Sorry…” Fiddling with his sleeves, Kaine allowed himself to be manhandled into an elevator, which almost immediately took the trio down into the biggest penthouse sweet kitchen he had ever seen.

Natasha pushed onto him a stool by the bar. He scrunched his knees up to balance, feet sticking to the seat’s side, shoulders hunched. He ran through the litany of daytime television shows he regularly watched with his mother, and determined that Bea Arthur would scold him something fierce if he was rude to his hosts (without due provocation).

The clone accepted a glass of water from her, but didn’t lift his mask to drink it. Hawkeye had vanished, after exchanging another glance with the red-head, saying something loudly about his spare set of hearing aids. He fiddled with his web shooter. “So, uh-“

Natasha settled across from him at the bar, smiling kindly.

Kaine felt his cheeks heat up. He cleared his throat, and had the glass half way to his mouth, before he remembered he was wearing his mask, and the long winded sit down he had with his father about the importance of keeping said mask on. He fumbled with it, before setting the glass down hard enough to splash on the counter.

The woman watched his movements, an inviting smile still sewn across her face. “So?” She said in response to his earlier cut off thought.

“Uh- I like your guys’s clubhouse.”

A light laugh crinkled her eyes into long lashed curves. “Thanks. I’m sure Tony appreciates the compliment.”

“That’s Iron Man?”

“Yup.” She leaned her cheek against her palm. “You should meet him. He knew the other Spiderman.”

“I’m not Spiderman.”

“Scarlet Spider, sorry. But you did show up wearing a Spiderman costume the first time, when Steve saw you.”

The teen curled his legs closer to his chest. “They made me change it.”

“Oh?”

Kaine pushed the glass across the bar with a finger. “Didn’t want people to think I was Spiderman.”

“Because he died?”

His head flinched up. “What? Dad’s not- Oh. No. They weren’t worried about me being mistaken for your Spiderman.”

Her eyes glinted. “So Spiderman calls himself your dad?”

“He is my dad!”

“Then who was ‘our Spiderman’?”

Kaine pulled his hand back and to wrap it tightly around his knees. “I gotta go.”

“Before Clint even gets back?”

He slid from the stool to the floor, arms crossed over his chest. “No, like, can I use your toilet?”

Her smile told him she didn’t believe his fib, but she pointed to the door. “Down the hall on the left.”

“Right, thanks.” Kaine did not scurry away, though it was a near thing. He punched the button for the elevator, and scrambled inside once the steel doors opened. Slumping against the wall, the teen checked his web shooters to make sure he had enough fluid left to swing home. He needed his parents to- he just needed them.

The doors opened too soon.

“This isn’t the roof,” Kaine said, peering out into an identical replica of the room he had just left. However, instead of Natasha sitting at the bar, a wan looking man with a dark goatee to match his watching eyes swirled a glass of something expensive in a tumbler.

“I had Friday bring you here. What a drink?” The man made no move to reach for another glass.

“No thank you.” The elevator did not appear to be moving any time soon, so Kaine stepped out onto the plush carpeting. He scanned the wall for a fire escape, but no other exit from the tower made itself apparent. His toes dug into the carpeting.

“I see you kept with the web costume theme.” Iron Man looked at the red clad teen impassively. “What, did you get a two for one special on spider powers?”

Kaine crossed his arms over his chest, one hand fiddling with his sleeve. “No.”

The billionaire hummed, stalking closer. “That costume’s new. Where did you get it built? I could make a spider suit better in my sleep; I did actually. Course I’ve had more time to go over the designs, correct some flaws. Did your mother make that?”

“No!” The teen’s voice cracked, and he flushed under his mask as the hero raised an eyebrow.

“For someone who’s claiming to be Peter’s twin, you sure sound a whole lot younger. His background check put him in his twenties, even though he looked like he was twelve. So, who are you actually?”

“I’m not telling you-“

“Of course, when I did another background check, after our illustrious Captain said he saw someone claiming to be Spiderman, you can imagine my surprise when it turned out that Peter Parker was not in fact dead. He had also, apparently, recently adopted two kids.”

Kaine’s fingers stilled, and his embrace around his chest tightened.

“So, to save you the trouble of playing dodge the twenty questions, I’ll tell you instead.” The inventor crossed to the bar, and poured himself a glass of something amber and pungent. Kaine turned as he moved, never letting his back to the other man.

“Nice hacking job on the birth certificates, by the way. I had to actually look twice at it to spot it as a fake.” He took a drink. “I’m betting on Peter Parker never existing- seriously orphan with a science background and no close friends, rather obvious, don’t you think? And, judging by the swoop of black suits that descended on the funeral parlor, and the mysterious disappearance of any documentation of Peter’s body, I’m thinking shadowy secret organization of some sort.” The ice in his glass clinked. “All I can’t seem to decide is which one you work for, and why they would be stupid enough to try the same trick on me twice.”

“I’m not!” Kaine protested, grip becoming painful around his ribs. “It’s not like that!”

Stark raised an eyebrow languidly. “Really?”

“Mom got dad and us out of there before they made us do anything! I’m not- We’re not-“ His breath came in tight bursts, which seemed unable to stay in his chest for longer than a moment.

Stark’s eyes were cold. “They got /you/ out huh? So then the first Peter was the spy. And your ‘mom and dad’ decided to use the suddenly available alias.” He snorted. “How convenient.”

Kaine’s nails drew blood against his elbows. “What do you want from us?”

“Ideally?” The billionaire sipped from his glass. “You and whoever’s making super-soldiers like you locked up in a cell somewhere, before another kid’s parents are assassinated.” He downed the rest in one gulp. “But I only just convinced Steve to not run off to parts unknown while his boyfriend’s on ice, and I think starting up another manhunt, especially with you, might make him pull out the divorce papers again. So-“ He spread his hands in a careless shrug. “I suppose this means I don’t want anything from you.”

A whirr of metal was Kaine’s only warning, before a pair of steel arms closed around him. the teen struggled, panicked, but the iron legion robot stood firm.

“But, until I can be sure there won’t be any more infiltrators or whoever it is that you work for is caught,” Stark said, casually putting his glass down on the bar. “I’m gonna have to ask you to come with me, so I can ask you a few questions to get this all squared away.”

Kaine could feel his heartbeat pound through his body, making his arms and hands pulse. Something shifted as he struggled against the metal body holding him, but the clone didn’t notice, until a spike of pain shot through his forearms. His flinch was covered by his struggles. 

Confused, he tried to flex his wrist, but found the joint locked painfully in place. He looked down, and saw two foot long bone spurs sprouting from his wrists. His web shooters squeezed painfully against his skin to accommodate the spurs, but stayed in place around his wrists.

Not pausing to let the panic set in at this new addition to his biology, Kaine slashed wildly, elbows bending at unnatural angles to stab at the robot’s joints. Metal screamed, and the spider clenched his teeth against the scrape he could feel grating through his arms. 

The robot’s grip faltered, allowing the teen to use his superior strength to wrench himself free.

Panting, Kaine turned to glower at Stark. “I’m not done. I won’t let you take me away!”

The billionaire’s scowl deepened at his words, and something behind his detachment turned fragile, like spun sugar. He clenched his jaw, fingers already scuttling over some kind of device on his wrist.

But Kaine had had enough.

He flung himself against the glass windows, spikes first. For a moment, he feared the reinforced material to be too much for his strength and new weapons to handle, but before that thought took hold, the glass spiderwebbed around his points of impact, and shattered outward.

He could hear the grinding metal gears and whirring cores of the two Iron Legion bots hot on his tail. Turning in the air, Kaine fired off a net of webbing, which caught on the bot’s feet, tying them together. They spun, trajectory thrown off kilter. The teen took the opportunity to shoot another line of web to pull himself deeper into the city. He swung, not looking back, and dropped into an alleyway as soon as he could.

Panting, the clone held his immobile wrists close to his chest, trying to will the bone spikes away. He heard a gust of wind above, and hurried to hide behind a dumpster.

“Come on!” He panted, heart still racing adrenaline through his veins. “Come on! Go away! Disappear!”

When the weapons still didn’t vanish, Kaine began rocking back and forth. “Okay, okay, okay. Think. Uh, um.” He tried to wrap his arms around himself, but nearly stabbed his thigh. “Right. Spikes. Uh. I need- Home. I need to get home.”

Stumbling to his feet, the clone cast about, arms held close to his chest. The sun was beginning to set, causing the street lamps to stutter to life. He couldn’t go around in the daylight in costume with those bots flying around. He fumbled for the discreet belt under his shirt, trying to open one of the pouches to get his phone. His wrists ached as the muscles tried to bend around the spurs, and he dropped his phone twice, before managing to balance it around the spikes.

“Mom?” His voice broke, and he hunkered down behind the dumpster again. “Mom, I- I need help.”  
…

“Rose Bud, what’s wrong? Are those bones? Did you break something? Wait, Are those Wolverine claws?! Peter, you cheated on me with Wolverine?!!” Deadpool swept the clone into his arms, heedless of the sharp spurs sprouting from the boy’s wrist.

Kaine burrowed into the familiar warmth, adrenaline long gone. He felt himself being lifted up, and thrown over his parent’s shoulder. 

“Come on, let’s get you home.” 

Careful not to jostle the shaking teen too much, Deadpool hailed a familiar cab, and tucked the boy into the back sear.

“Dopinder, there’s a crisp fifty waiting for you if you can get us home in ten minutes.”

The cabbie’s grin could be seen in the mirror. “Right away Mr. Pool.”

Kaine leaned close to his parent’s side all through the drive, and allowed himself to be manhandled up the stairs to their apartment. Only when he was safely curled on the couch, did he heed the bubble of emotion which had been threatening to break him, ever since he called for help.

“I- I-“ Tears leaked out of the clone’s eyes as he clutched at Wade’s chest. “He was trying to take me away!”

The merc made hushed soothing sounds, hands running over his son’s back. “It’s ok Rose Bud. No one’s taking you away. Can you tell us what happened?”

Kaine looked up to see his father standing nearby, little Benny held in his arms. His lips wobbled, throat seizing. “Stark,” he managed to croak. “He- he- tried to take me away! He- he wanted to question me about their Spiderman, and said that we were all evil spies, and- and that-“ His words were cut off, as his mother clutched him to his chest.

Deadpool’s blank face betrayed the murder broiling beneath. “I’m going to kill that genius billionaire playboy philanthropist.”

Kaine burrowed deeper into his parent’s embrace, face pressed against a leather clad shoulder. “No don’t! Maybe he’ll leave us alone if we didn’t do anything!”

Wade threaded his fingers through his son’s hair, voice softening. “Oh Rose Bud, the self-important dousche nozzles always say things like that. Before I kill them.”

“Wade, don’t.” Peter sat on the couch, a snoozing Benny in his arms. 

“But Babe-“

The hero shook his head. “Killing Stark would just bring all the Avengers down on us,” He sighed. “They think we’re some kind of, what, HYDRA sleeper cell or something?”

Kaine nodded despondently, still clutching his other parent.

“Right, ok.” He rocked to his feet. “I’m gonna make a call.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:
> 
> It’s not that I don’t like Tony’s character, it’s just that I think if he thought his baby-spider was a trap, he would not be friendly at all to the rest of them.
> 
> Kaine, you sweet little grasshopper that got pulled into the web of two super spies. My poor child. Also, spikes are cannon for Kaine in the comics. I explain it here, because the clones were made from Peter after being exposed to the MGH, so, under the right circumstances, they can get some weird cracker jack prizes, different from what Peter got.


	16. Radio Spider

…

“And today we have a very special guest on our show. He just swung into our top floor office, and is currently sitting on the ceiling. I am happy to introduce your friendly neighborhood Spiderman!”

“Uh, hi. Glad to be here Trish.”

“I’ld like to remind our listeners that we’re not taking any calls today, at the request of our guest. Thanks again to those listeners who participated in our pole online for the question they wanted answered!” A throat clearing. “So, Spiderman, I have to ask the question everyone is dying to know! Are you single?”

Laughter. “Nope! I am happily in a long term relationship.”

“Should we be expecting wedding bells in the future?”

More laughter. “We’ve actually been engaged for a while now, but life just keeps intervening, so we haven’t been able to have a ceremony like we want.”

Lighter laughter. “Now that would be the wedding of the century.”

“I can see the headlines now, ‘Wall Crawling Menace Married!’ “ 

“That hardly seems fair. Unless you leave footprints on my ceiling, then I might just agree.”

“Shoes are clean, I swear.”

“Well, can we talk about your string of bad press over the years? You’re technically New York’s longest reported on vigilante hero, but the papers seem to like taking the negative spin on what you do, despite the many personal testimonies saying the exact opposite.”

“Ah, well, I guess the bad press was because I’ve been known for a lot longer than the bigger heroes. There wasn’t really a word for us besides vigilante, and that has a pretty bad connotation.”

“But you would think the Bugle would at least start trying to redact the malicious articles they printed about you before.”

“Well~ I hear the editor’s a bit single minded.”

“Is that why you stopped posing for their pictures? Got fed up?”

Chuckling. “I don’t know about that. I never pay much attention to the paparazzi.” 

More laughter.

Trish cleared her throat. “So, you were seen earlier this year standing with Tony Stark as he professed his support for the Sokovia Accords. Could you tell us a bit about that?”

Throat clearing. “That wasn’t actually me. That was my…son.”

“You have kids?”

“Yeah, they mean the world to me.”

“Adopted?”

“No, they’re mine. From an, uh, earlier relationship.”

“Do they ever get a chance to visit their mother?”

“Uh, we do try to visit the graveyard on the anniversary of her death.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s all right. She passed a long time ago. Talking about her reminds me of how amazing she was, and of how lucky I am to find someone I love just as much again.”

“Can I ask how she died? If that’s all right.”

An uncomfortable throat clearing. “No, it’s fine. Uh.” Another cough. “Well, uh, one of my enemies found out my identity, and tracked us down. She, uh.” A shaky breath blew across the mike. “She didn’t make it.”

The sound of shifting fabric, as if an arm was reaching across the setup to hold another’s hand in comfort. “God, I’m so sorry.”

Shaky chuckles. “It’s why I’m so adamant about the mask. Sorry again to the poor guy who had to clip the mike to my suit.”

“Can you tell us a bit about your kids? Or is that crossing the secret identity line?”

“No it’s fine.” Sheepish laughter. “My youngest is still pretty little, and the eldest is in his teens.”

“Let me guess, he was the one who ran off to be a super hero in a fit of teenage rebellion.”

A slight pause. “…No. That was his twin.”

“Was?”

“Yes.”

“Did Tony Stark have your permission to allow your son onto the Avengers?”

“I didn’t know at the time. I was, uh-“ A long drawn out sigh. “Look, Trish, people like me get involved in a lot of stuff, and even if we try to just help people out, other people notice. Some of those people got ahold of me, because they wanted to see how my powers worked, and that’s when my son joined up with the Avengers.”

“Where was your partner in all this?”

“They were trying to find me. The kids were left with a relative.”

“Must have been hard for one person to juggle two super powered teenagers and a baby all by themselves.”

“…yeah. It was a bad situation all around.”

“If you could say anything to Tony Stark for his part in what happened, what would it be?”

“I don’t have anything to say to him.”

“That sounded rather emphatic.”

“My family and I just want to be left alone. If Stark has a problem with that, or tries to recruit another one of my kids for his hair brained crusades, then we’ll be exchanging words.”

Light laughter. “Then, are there any words you would like to share with other members of the super powered community, who might be planning on donning a mask and tights?”

Laughter. “Uh, don’t? Seriously, crime fighting is dangerous. If you really want to help your community and rescue people, you can volunteer with the fire department or a local soup kitchen. With great power comes great responsibility, whether that power is walking on walls or helping someone carry their bags across the street.”

“That’s really noble.”

“Thanks, but I’m not the one who said it first.”

“Well, that’s all the time we have for today. Thanks again for coming in today Spiderman.”

“My pleasure Trish.”  
…

Later, cuddled on the couch, snoozing children sprawled across the floor as the credits rolled down the TV of family movie night, Wade leaned close to his partner.

“Are you sure that was a good idea?”

Peter turned his face to press into the crook of the other’s neck. “I don’t know. But I can’t protect my family by staying silent anymore. That won’t work here.” He sighed, breath tickling Wade’s skin. “At least it will focus Stark on me and not Kaine.”

Strong arms curled around thin shoulders. “Let him try.”

A laugh, and a kiss to a pulse point. “Hm, my knight in shining armor.”

A deeper chuckle. “And don’t you forget it.”  
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N:  
> Yes it’s short. Sorry for no updates, I was in a forest studying marsh microbes and had no signal or time. On a side note, never eat anything from the Chesapeake Bay. So much industrial runoff.


	17. Bonding

/I’m flying in from Italy and will be in New York next week. We need to meet up!/

Peter glanced at the text chain again, faint smile touching the corners of his lips. He was sitting in one of the numerous cafes in New York, picking at a muffin while glancing frequently at the door. The boys were with Wade, hopefully at home, but more likely running across the city on some hair brained adventure. At least they finally got Benny a proper baby carrier.

The bell over the door pinged, and a larger than life red headed woman whirled in. Her gaze fell on Peter, and he stood up in time for the woman to wrap her arms around him.

“Heya Tiger!”

“Mary Jane, it’s been a while!”

She let him go and kissed the air over his cheeks. “Too long!” She let him go. “Let me just get a drink, and and we’ll talk. It’s so good to see you again!”

A few minutes later, and Mary Jane was seated across from him, holding a steaming cup between her palms, despite the encroaching summer heat felt even through the glass windows.

“So I heard your little interview.”

Peter chuckled uncomfortably, picking crumbs off his muffin. “Yeah, well…It’s kinda complicated.”

Mary Jane grinned over her coffee. “Wow, you’re a real family man now! Why wasn’t I invited to the wedding?”

Peter chuckled, plucking at his sleeve. “Well, we’ve not actually had one yet. Things just seem to keep getting …complicated.”

“And where is Mr. Right now?”

“At home watching the kids.”

“You guys have kids? Seriously? I thought it was, like, you being metaphorical about some younger heroes or something.”

Peter chuckled. “Uh, well, that’s another long story…”

The woman set her elbows on the table, and hunkered down in her seat. “I’ve got time.”  
…

Meanwhile, back at the apartment, the doorbell rang.

In a flurry of red kevlar, it opened to reveal a wrong footed looking delivery boy with more spots than freckles, and six boxes piled in his arms.

“I got a delivery for a Mr. Van Wilder?”

“That’s me!” The tallest of the masked crowd said, throwing a handful of cash at the deliverer, and snatching the pizzas from his arms.

Kaine giggled, hands pressed over his own red mask, as he kicked the door shut.

“So, now that the food is here, it is time to pass on the keys to my kingdom.” Wade strode over to the normally locked hall closet, and flung open the door dramatically. Over his shoulder, wearing on of his mommy’s spare masks, Benny banged his fists on the bending edges of his baby carrier excitedly.

Kaine awed appreciatively, and his parent draped a hand over his shoulders, while gesticulating with much prompt and circumstance. “Look Rose Bud, everything the light touches will one day be yours!” He pulled a string attached to a bulb in the ceiling, which clicked on with a blink of LED brightness.

Black barrels and bullet casings held the image of a gleam, even though the metal had been dulled to prevent any such reflection occurring to give away a shooter’s position. Grenades painted like pineapples lined the walls in neat little racks, above a miscellaneous assortment of tasers and brass knuckles. A bazooka leaned innocently in the corner.

Benny squealed in delight.

Kaine grinned under his mask. “Neat! Does dad know you have all this?”

“What Petey doesn’t know won’t hurt him. Now let’s pull out some of the goodies!” Deadpool spread out his gear with manic cheer. “So this sniper scope has the best range if you’re trying to look through multiple layers of glass! And this one can shoot little listening devices!”

[No, that’s the one with the suction cups for bombs.]

{Well, you can stick a microphone on it instead.}

“Multipurpose weaponry,” the merc agreed.

Kaine listened with rapt attention. Benny drooled through his borrowed mask.  
…

“Have a fun day being a spider spy?” Deadpool crowed, striding into his dingy apartment, arms full of groceries.

{Only essentials, of course.}

[Hot pockets, bagel bites, taco fixings, maple syrup, pancake mix-]

Peter was curled in the corner of the ceiling, cocooned in an orb like web. He poked his head out blearily. “Wade, did you get formula? We’re nearly out- Ben eats like you at a taco convention.”

“Sure I did sweetums!” He pulled the container out of a plastic bag and shook it for emphasis. “Have fun lunch-ing with your friend?”

“It was great. Kinda forgot how much energy it takes to keep up with MJ though,” the hero yawned. “And what’s this I hear about a spider spy?”

“Oh, Kaine was feeling sad, I think he’s practicing teenage angst or worried about school coming up or something, so I lent him some of my gear to play with.”

“What?” Any remaining drowsiness was forcibly jolted from the brunette’s mind. Inside the web, Benny fussed, evidently disturbed from his nap. Peter shushed him, before craning his head to glower at is partner. “Wade! You can’t go handing a teenager dangerous military grade weaponry! Someone could get hurt!”

“It’s not like I gave him anything really dangerous.” The merc sighed, unpacking groceries on the counter. “Just a sniper rifle with rubber bullets for the pigeons.”

“Wade!”

“Peter! See, I can say your name too!”

The hero’s jaw set dangerously. “I don’t want our kids-“

“Babe, I’ll stop you right there. Our kids are already messed up in this. And they might have your stick-to-it-ive-ness and whatever other cracker jack prize of a power they get, but they’re always going to be a target to someone because of who and what we are. If I can give them any kind of edge, then I’ll sleep better. They don’t have to ever use what I teach them, but at least they’ll have it if they need it.”

Peter sighed. “You know I can’t argue when you get all logical like that.”

“Yup.” Deadpool grinned devilishly, before returning to the groceries. “So about that baby formula…”   
…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> …  
> A/N: Another short one, oh well. Now, should I finish this and post the next bit as a new stories in the series or just keep going? decisions decisions…

**Author's Note:**

> ...
> 
> Reviews feed the muse!!  
> …  
> 


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